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Hbopting 

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BY 

KATE SANBORN 

k* 

AUTHOR OF 

WIT OF WOMEN, HOME PICTURES OF ENGLISH POETS, 
SANITY AND INSANITY, SHADOWS OF GENIUS, 
SUNSHINE AND RAINBOW CALENDARS, 

ETC. 







Copyright, 1891, 

By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 

3y Ti8naf« 


< < 
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CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER 

I. — From Gotham to Gooseville 

II. — Auctions 

III. — Buying a Horse 
*IV. — For those who love Pets . 

V. — Starting a Poultry Farm . 

VI. — Ghosts 

VII. — Daily Distractions 

VIII.— The Prose of New'England Farm 

Life 

IX. — The Passing of the Peacocks 

X. — Looking back 


PAGE 

5 

15 

34 

48 

62 

78 

96 

108 

127 

154 




An old farm-house with meadows wide, 
And sweet with clover on each side. 

Marion Douglass. 


ADOPTING 

AN ABANDONED FARM. 


CHAPTER I. 

FROM GOTHAM TO GOOSEVILLE. 

I have now come to the farmer’s life, with which 
I am exceedingly delighted, and which seems to me 
to belong especially to the life of a wise man. 

Cicero. 

Weary of boarding at seashore and 
mountain, tired of traveling in search of 
comfort, hating hotel life, I visited a coun- 
try friend at Gooseville, Conn, (an as- 
sumed name for Foxboro, Mass.), and 
passed three happy weeks in her peace- 
ful home. 

Far away at last from the garish hor- 
rors of dress, formal dinners, visits, and 
drives, the inevitable and demoralizing 
gossip and scandal ; far away from hotel 


6 &bo;pting an &banboneb iFarnt. 


piazzas, with their tedious accompani- 
ments of corpulent dowagers, exclusive 
or inquisitive, slowly dying from too 
much food and too little exercise; en- 
nuied spinsters; gushing buds; athletic 
collegians, cigarettes in mouths and 
hands in pockets ; languid, drawling 
dudes; old bachelors, fluttering around 
the fair human flower like September but- 
terflies; fancy work, fancy work, like Pe- 
nelope’s web, never finished ; pug dogs 
of the aged and asthmatic variety. Ev- 
erything there but MEN — they are wise 
enough to keep far away. 

Before leaving this haven of rest, I 
heard that the old-fashioned farm-house 
just opposite was for sale. And, as pur- 
chasers of real estate were infrequent at 
Gooseville, it would be rented for forty 
dollars a year to any responsible tenant 
who would “ keep it up.” 

After examining the house from garret 
to cellar and looking over the fields with 


-from (Sot!) am to ©oooetrille. 7 


a critical eye, I telegraphed to the owner, 
fearful of losing such a prize, that I 
would take it for three years. For it 
captivated me. The cosy “ settin’-room,” 
with a “ pie closet ” and anN^pper tiny 
cupboard known as a “ rum closet ” and 
its pretty fire place — bricked up, but ca- 
pable of being rescued from such prosaic 
“desuetude”; a large sunny dining-room, 
with a brick oven, an oven suggestive 
of brown bread and baked beans — yes, 
the baked beans of my childhood, that 
adorned the breakfast table on a Sunday 
morning, cooked with just a little molas- 
ses and a square piece of crisp salt pork 
in center, a dish to tempt a dying an- 
chorite. 

There were two broad landings on the 
stairs, the lower one just the place for an 
old clock to tick out its impressive “ For- 
ever — Never — Never — Forever” ci la 
Longfellow. Then the long “ shed cham- 
ber ” with a wide swinging door opening 


8 QUopting an ^banboncb iFarttt. 


to the west, framing a sunset gorgeous 
enough to inspire a mummy. And the 
attic, with its possible treasures. 

There was also a queer little room, dark 
and mysterious, in the center of house on 
the ground floor, without even one win- 
dow, convenient to retire to during severe 
thunder storms or to evade a personal in- 
terview with a burglar; just the place, 
too, for a restless ghost to revisit. 

Best of all, every room was blessed 
with two closets. 

Outside, what rare attractions ! Twen- 
ty-five acres of arable land, stretching to 
the south ; a grand old barn, with dusty, 
cobwebbed, hay-filled lofts, stalls for two 
horses and five cows ; hen houses, with 
plenty of room to carry out a long-cher- 
ished plan of starting a poultry farm. 

The situation, too, was exceptional, 
since the station from which I could take 
trains direct to Boston and New York 
almost touched the northern corner of the 


.front (ftotlptm to (^oosetrille. 9 


farm, and nothing makes one so willing 
to stay in a secluded spot as the certain- 
ty that he or she can leave it at any time 
and plunge directly into the excitements 
and pleasures which only a large city 
gives. 

What charmed me most of all was a 
tiny but fascinating lakelet in the pasture 
near the house; a “spring-hole” it was 
called by the natives, but a lakelet it was 
to me, full of the most entrancing possi- 
bilities. It could be easily enlarged at 
once, and by putting a wind-mill on the 
hill, by the deep pool in “ Chicken 
Brook ” where the pickerel loved to sport, 
and damming something, somewhere, 
I could create or evolve a miniature 
pond, transplant water lilies, pink and 
white, set willow shoots around the well- 
turfed, graveled edge, with roots of the 
forget-me-not hiding under the banks 
their blue blossoms ; just the flower for 
happy lovers to gather as they lingered 


io &bopting an &banboneb farm. 


in their rambles to feed my trout. And 
there should be an arbor, vine-clad and 
sheltered from the curious gaze of the 
passers-by, and a little boat, moored at a 
little wharf, and a plank walk leading up 
to the house. And — and oh, the idealism 
possible when an enthusiastic woman first 
rents a farm — an “ abandoned ” farm ! 

It may be more exact to say that my 

farm was not exactly “ abandoned,” as its 

% 

owner desired a tenant and paid the 
taxes ; say rather depressed, full of evil 
from long neglect, suffering from lack of 
food and general debility. 

As “ abandoned farms ” are now a sub- 
ject of general interest, let me say that 
my find was nothing unusual. The num- 
ber of farms without occupants in New 
Hampshire in August, 1889, was 1,342 and 
in Maine 3,318 ; and I saw lately a farm 
of twenty acres advertised “ free rent and 
a present of fifty dollars.” 

But it is my farm I want you to care 


.from (Srotljam to (Soosetrille. 


1 1 


about. I could hardly wait until winter 
was over to begin my new avocation. 
By the last of March I was assured by 
practical agriculturists (who regarded me 
with amusement tempered with pity) that 
it was high time to prune the lazy fruit 
trees and arouse, if possible, the debili- 
tated soil — in short, begin to “ keep it up.” 

So I left New York for the scene of 
my future labors and novel lessons in 
life, accompanied by a German girl who 
proved to be merely an animated onion in 
matters of cooking, a half-breed hired 
man, and a full-bred setter pup who suf- 
fered severely from nostalgia and strong- 
ly objected to the baggage car and sepa- 
ration from his playmates. 

If wit is, as has been averred, the “ jux- 
taposition of dissimilar ideas,” then from 
“ Gotham to Gooseville ” is the most scin- 
tillating epigram ever achieved. Nothing 
was going on at Gooseville except time 
and the milk wagon collecting for the 


12 


&bojjting an &banboneft .farm. 


creamery. The latter came rumbling 
along every morning at 4.30 precisely, 
with a clatter of cans that never failed 
to arouse the soundest sleeper. 

The general dreariness of the land- 
scape was depressing. Nature herself 
seemed in a lethargic trance, and her 
name was mud. 

But with a house to furnish and twen- 
ty-five enfeebled acres to resuscitate, one 
must not mind. Advanced scientists as- 
sure us of life, motion, even intelligence, 
appetite, and affection in the most primi- 
tive primordial atoms. So, after a little 
study, I found that the inhabitants of 
Gooseville and its outlying hamlets were 
neither dead nor sleeping. It was only 
by contrast that they appeared comatose 
and moribund. 

Indeed, the degree of gayety was quite 
startling. I was at once invited to 
“ gatherings ” which rejoiced in the para- 
doxical title of “ Mum Sociables,” where 


-front 0>ott)am to ©ooocnille. 13 


a penalty of five cents was imposed on 
each person for speaking (the revenue to 
go toward buying a new hearse, a cheer- 
ful object of benevolence), and the occa- 
sions were most enjoyable. There was 
also a “ crazy party ” at Way-back, the 
next village. This special form of lunacy 
I did not indulge in — farming was enough 
for me — but the painter who was enliven- 
ing my dining-roojn with a coating of 
vivid red and .green, kindly told me all 
about it, how much I missed, and how the 
couple looked who took the first prize. 
The lady wore tin plates, tin cans, tin 
spoons, etc., sewed on to skirt and waist in 
fantastic patterns, making music as she 
walked, and on her head a battered old 
coffee pot, with artificial' flowers which 
had outlived their usefulness sticking out 
of the spout ; and her winning partner was 
arrayed in rag patchwork of the most 
demented variety. 

“ Youdorter gone ” said he ; “ ’twas a 


i4 ^bopting an Qtbanboneb irarm. 


great show. But I bet youder beaten the 
hull lot on ’em if you’d set your mind 
on’t ! ” 

My walls were now covered with old- 
fashioned papers, five and ten cents a roll, 
and cheap matting improved the floors. 
But how to furnish eleven rooms? This 
brings me to — 


CHAPTER II. 


AUCTIONS. 

“ Going, going, gone.” 

Next came the excitement of auc- 
tions, great occasions, and of vital impor- 
tance to me, as I was ambitious to fur- 
nish the entire house for one hundred 
dollars’ 

When the head of a family dies a set- 
tlement of the estate seems to make an 
auction necessary I am glad of the cus- 
tom It proved of invaluable service to 
me, and the mortality among old people 
was quite phenomenal at Gooseville and 
thereabouts last year While I deeply re- 
gretted the demise of each and all, still 
this general taking off was opportune for 
my needs. 

There were seventeen auctions last 


1 6 &bcrpting an Qtbanboncb -farm. 


season, and all but two were attehded by 
me or my representatives. 

A country auction is not so exciting 
as one in the city; still you must be wide- 
awake and cool, or you will be fleeced. 
An experienced friend, acquainted with 
the auctioneer, piloted me through my 
first sale, and for ten dollars I bought 
enough really valuable furniture to fill a 
large express wagon — as a large desk 
with drawers, little and big, fascinating 
pigeon holes, and a secret drawer, for two 
dollars; queer old table, ten cents; good 
solid chairs, nine cents each; mahogany 
center-table, one dollar and sixteen cents ; 
and, best of all, a tall and venerable clock 
for the landing, only eight dollars ! Its 
“ innards ” sadly demoralized, but capable 
of resuscitation, the weights being tin- 
cans filled with sand and attached by 
strong twine to the “works.” It has to 
be wound twice daily, and when the hour 
hand points to six and the other to ten, I 


Unctions. 


17 


guess that it is about quarter past two, 
and in five minutes I hear the senile time- 
piece strike eleven ! 

The scene was unique. The sale had 
been advertised in post-office and stores 
as beginning at 10 a. m., but at eleven 
the farmers and their women folks were 
driving toward the house. A dozen old 
men, chewing tobacco and looking wise, 
were in the barn yard examining the 
stock to be sold, the carts and farming 
tools ; a flock of hens were also to be dis- 
posed of, at forty cents each. 

On such occasions the families from 
far and near who want to dispose of any 
old truck are allowed to bring it to add 
to the motley display. The really valu- 
able possessions, if any, are kept back, 
either for private sale or to be divided 
among the heirs. I saw genuine an- 
tiques occasionally — old oak chests, fine- 
ly carved oaken chairs — but these were 
rare. After the horses have been driven 


2 


1 8 ^bopting an &banboneb £avm. 


up and down the street, and with the 
other stock disposed of, it is time for 
lunch. Following the crowd into the 
kitchen, you see two barrels of crackers 
open, a mammoth cheese of the skim- 
milk species with a big knife by it, and 
on the stove a giant kettle in which cot- 
ton bags full of coffee are being distilled 
in boiling water. You are expected to 
dip a heavy white mug into the kettle for 
your share of the fragrant reviving bev- 
erage, cut off a hunk of cheese, and eat 
as many crackers as you can. It tasted 
well, that informal “free lunch.” 

Finding after one or two trials that the 
interested parties raised rapidly on any- 
thing I desired. I used to send Gusta and 
John, nicknamed very properly “ Omnis- 
cience and Omnipotence,” which names 
did equally well when reversed (like a pa- 
per cuff), and they, less verdant than their 
mistress, would return with an amazing 
• array of stuff. We now have everything 


Auctions. 


19 


but a second-hand pulpit, a wooden leg, 
and a coffin plate. We utilized a cra- 
dle and antique churn as a composite 
flower stand ; an immense spinning-wheel 
looks pretty covered with running vines, 
an old carriage lantern gleams brightly 
on my piazza every evening. I nearly 
bought a horse for fifteen dollars, and 
did secure a wagon for one dollar and 
a half, which, after a few needed repairs, 
costing only twenty-six dollars, was my 
pride, delight and comfort, and the envy 
of the neighborhood. Men came from 
near and far to examine that wagon, felt 
critically of every wheel, admired the 
shining coat of dark-green paint, and 
would always wind up with: “I vum, if 
that ’ere wagon ain’t fine ! Why, it’s 
wuth fifty dollars, now, ef it’s wuth a 
cent ! ” After a hard day’s work, it 
seemed a gratification to them to come 
with lanterns to renew their critical sur- 
vey, making a fine Rembrandtish study 


20 ^bopting an &banboneb -farm. 


as they stood around it and wondered. 
A sleigh was bought for three dollars 
which, when painted by our home artist, 
is both comfortable and effective. 

At one auction, where I was the only 
woman present, I bid on three shovels 
(needed to dig worms for my prize hens !) 
and, as the excitement increased with a 
rise in bids from two cents to ten, I cried, 
“Eleven!” And the gallant old fellow 
in command roared out as a man opened 
his mouth for “Twelve!”: “I wouldn’t 
bid ag’in a woman ef I’se you. Let ’er 
have ’em! Madam, Mum, or Miss — I 
can’t pernounce your name and don’t 
rightly know how to spell it — but the 
shovels are yourn ! ” 

Attending auctions may be an acquired 
taste, but it grows on one like any other 
habit, and whenever a new and tempting 
announcement calls, I rise to the occasion 
and hasten to the scene of action, be the 
weather what it may. And many a treas- 


Auctions. 


21 


ure has been picked up in this way. 
Quaint old mirrors with the queerest pict- 
ures above, brass knockers, candlesticks 
of queer patterns, cups and saucers and 
plates, mugs of all sizes, from one gen- 
erous enough to satisfy the capacities of 
a lager-soaked Dutchman to a dear little 
child’s mug, evidently once belonging to a 
series. Mine was for March. A mother 
sitting on a bench, with a bowl of possi- 
bly Lenten soup by her side, is reproving 
a fat little fellow for his gross appetite 
at this solemn season. He is weeping, 
and on her other side a pet dog is plead- 
ing to be fed. The rhyme explains the 
reason : 

The jovial days of feasting past, 

'Tis pious prudence come at last ; 

And eager gluttony is taught 
To be content with what it ought. 

A warming pan and a foot stove, just as 
it was brought home from a merry sleigh- 
ride, or a solemn hour at the “meetin’- 


22 


^bopting an &banboneb .farm. 


house,” recalling that line of Thomas 
Gray’s : 

E’en in our ashes live their wonted fires. 

Sometimes I would offer a little more 
to gain some coveted treasure already 
bid off. How a city friend enjoyed the 
confidences of a man who had agreed to 
sell for a profit ! How he chuckled as 
he told of “ one of them women who he 
guessed was a leetle crazy.” “Why, jest 
think on’t ! I only paid ten cents for 
that hull lot on the table yonder, and 
she" (pointing to me) “ she gin me a 
quarter for that old pair o’ tongs ! ” 

One day I heard some comments on 
myself after I had bid on a rag carpet 
and offered more than the other women 
knew it was worth. 

“ She’s got a million, I hear.” 

“ Wanter know — merried ? ” 

“ No ; just an old maid.” 

“ Judas Priest ! Howd she git it ?” 


Auctions. 


23 


“ Writin’, I ’spoze. She writes love 
stories and sich for city papers. Some 
on ’em makes a lot.” 

It is not always cheering to overhear 
too much. When some of my friends, 
whom I had taken to a favorite junk 
shop, felt after two hours of purchase 
and exploration that they must not keep 
me waiting any longer, the man, in his 
eagerness to make a few more sales, ex- 
claimed : “ Let her wait ; her time ain’t 
wuth nothin’ ! ” 

At an auction last summer, one man 
told me of a very venerable lantern, an 
heirloom in his first wife’s family, so long, 
measuring nearly a yard with his hands. 
I said I should like to go with him to see 
it, as I was making a collection of lan- 
terns. He looked rather dazed, and as I 
turned away he inquired of my friend “ if 
I wusn’t rather — ” She never allowed 
him to finish, and his lantern is now 


mine. 


24 ^bopting cm Qlbanboneb ihtrrn. 


People seem to have but little senti- 
ment about their associations with furni- 
ture long in the family. 

The family and a few intimate friends 
usually sit at the upper windows gazing 
curiously on the crowd, with no evidence 
of feeling or pathetic recollections. 

I lately heard a daughter say less than 
a month after her father’s death, point- 
ing to a small cretonne-covered lounge : 
“ Father made me that lounge with his 
own hands when I’s a little girl. He 
tho’t a sight on’t it, and allers kep’ it 
’round. But my house is full now. I 
ain’t got no room for’t.” It sold for 
twelve cents ! 

Arthur Helps says that human nature 
craves, nay enjoys, tragedy ; and when 
away from dramatic representation of 
crime and horrors and sudden death, as 
in this quiet country life, the people grat- 
ify their needs in the sorrows, sins, and 
calamities that befall their neighbors. 


Auctions. 


2 5 


I strongly incline to Hawthorne's idea 
that furniture becomes magnetized, per- 
meated, semi-vitalized, so that the chairs, 
sofas, and tables that have outlived their 
dear owners in my own family have al- 
most a sacred value to me. 

Still, why moralize. Estates must be 
settled, and auctions are a blessing in dis- 
guise. 

Of course, buying so much by substi- 
tutes, I amassed a lot of curious things, 
of which I did not know the use or value, 
and therefore greatly enjoyed the experi- 
ence of the Spectator as given in the 
Christian Union. 

He attended an auction with the fol- 
lowing result: “A long table was cov- 
ered with china, earthenware, and glass ; 
and the mantel beyond, a narrow shelf 
quite near the ceiling, glittered with a 
tangled maze of clean brass candlesticks, 
steel snuffers, and plated trays. At one 
end dangled a huge warming pan, and on 


26 ^boptinQ an &banbonci> farm. 


the wall near it hung a bit of canvas in a 
gilded frame, from -which the portrait 
had as utterly faded as he whom it repre- 
sented had vanished into thin air. It 
was a strange place, a room from which 
many a colonial citizen had passed to 
take a stroll upon the village street ; and 
here, in sad confusion to be sure, the 
dishes that graced his breakfast table. 
The Spectator could have lingered there 
if alone for half a day, but not willingly 
for half an hour in such a crowd. The 
crowd, however, closed every exit and he 
had to submit. A possible chance to se- 
cure some odd bit was his only consola- 
tion. Why the good old soul who last 
occupied the house, and who was born in 
it fourscore years ago, should necessarily 
have had only her grandmother’s table- 
ware, why every generation of this fami- 
ly should have suffered no losses by 
breakage, was not asked. Every bit, 
even to baking-powder prizes of green 


Auctions. 


27 


and greasy glass, antedated the Revolu- 
tion, and the wise and mighty of Small- 
town knew no better. A bit of egg shell 
sticking to a cracked teacup was stolen 
as a relic of Washington’s last breakfast 
in Smalltown. 

“ While willow-pattern china was pass- 
ing into other hands the Spectator made 
a discovery. A curious piece of polished, 
crooked mahogany was seen lying be- 
tween soup tureens and gravy boats. 
He picked it up cautiously, fearing to at- 
tract attention, and, with one eye every- 
where else, scanned it closely. What a 
curious paper-knife ! he thought, and sly- 
ly tucked it back of a pile of plates. 
This must be kept track of ; it may prove 
a veritable prize. But all his care went 
for naught. A curious old lady at his 
elbow had seen every action. ‘ What is 
it ? ’ she asked, and the wooden wonder 
was brought to light. ‘ It’s an old-fash- 


28 &bo;pting an &banboneb .farm. 


ioned wooden butter knife. I’ve seen 
’em ’afore this. Don’t you know in old 
times it wasn’t everybody as had silver, 
and mahogany knives for butter was 
put on the table for big folks. We folks 
each used our own knife.’ All this was 
dribbled into the Spectator’s willing ears, 
and have the relic he would at any cost. 
Time and again he nervously turned it 
over to be sure that it was on the table, 
and so excited another’s curiosity. ‘ What 
is it ? ’ a second and still older lady asked. 
‘ A colonial butter knife,’ the Spectator 
replied with an air of much antiquarian 
lore. ‘ A butter knife ! No such thing. 
My grandfather had one just like this, 
and it’s a pruning knife. He wouldn’t 
use a steel knife because it poisoned the 
sap.’ What next ? Paper knife, butter 
knife, and pruning knife ! At all events 
every new name added a dollar to its 
value, and the Spectator wondered what 
the crowd would say, for now it was in 


Auctions. 


29 


the auctioneer’s hands. He looked at it 
with a puzzled expression and merely 
cried : * What is bid for this ? * His ig- 
norance was encouraging. It started at 
a dime and the Spectator secured it for 
a quarter. For a moment he little won- 
dered at the fascination of public sales. 
The past was forgiven, for now luck had 
turned and he gloried in the possession 
of a prize. 

“To seek the outer world was a peril- 
ous undertaking for fear that the triply- 
named knife might come to grief ; but a 
snug harbor was reached at last, and hug- 
ging the precious bit, the Spectator myste- 
riously disappeared on reaching his home. 
No one must know of his success until 
the mystery was cleaned, brightened, and 
restored to pristine beauty. The -Specta- 
tor rubbed the gummy surface with kero- 
sene, and then polished it with flannel. 
Then warm water and a tooth brush were 


30 ^bopting an &banboncb .farm. 


brought into play, and the oil all re- 
moved. Then a long dry polishing, and 
the restoration was complete. Certainly 
no other Smalltowner had such a wooden 
knife; and it was indeed beautiful. Black 
in a cross light, red in direct light, and 
kaleidoscopic by gaslight. Ah, such a 
prize ! The family knew that something 
strange was transpiring, but what no one 
had an inkling. They must wait patiently, 
and they did. The Spectator proudly ap- 
peared, his prize in hand. ‘ See there ! * 
he cried in triumph, and they all looked 
eagerly ; and when the Spectator’s pride 
was soaring at its highest, a younger 
daughter cried, ‘Why, papa, it’s the back 
of a hair-brush ! ’ And it was.” 

An auctioneer usually tries to be off- 
hand, waggish, and brisk — a cross between 
a street peddler and a circus clown, with a 
hint of the forced mirth of the after-din- 
ner speaker. Occasionally the jokes are 


Unctions. 


3 * 


good and the answers from the audience 
show the ready Yankee wit. 

Once an exceedingly fat man, too obese 
to descend from his high wagon, bought 
an immense dinner bell and he was hit 
unmercifully. A rusty old fly-catcher 
elicited many remarks — as “no flies on 
that.” I bought several chests, half full 
of rubbish, but found, alas ! no hidden 
treasure, no missing jewels, no money hid 
away by miserly fingers and forgotten. 
Jake Corey, who was doing some work 
for me, encouraged me to hope. He 
said : “ I hear ye patronize auctions putty 
reg’lar; sometimes there is a good deal 
to be made that way, and then ag’in there 
isn’t. I never had no luck that way, but 
it’s like getting married, it’s a lottery ! 
Folks git queer and put money in some 
spot, where they’re apt to forgit all about 
it. Now I knew a man who bought an 
old hat and a sight of other stuff ; jest 
threw in the hat. And when he got 


32 &bopting an &banbotteb ifarm. 


home and come to examine it ef thar 
warn’t three hundred dollars in good bills, 
chucked in under the sweater ! ” 

“ You ought to git over to Mason’s auc- 
tion to Milldon, sure. It’s day after to- 
morrow at nine sharp. You see he’d a for- 
tune left him, but he run straight through 
it buying the goldarndest things you ever 
heerd tell on — calves with six legs, dogs 
with three eyes or two tails, steers that 
could be druv most as well as hosses 
(Barnum he got hold o’ ’em and tuk ’em 
round with his show) ; all sorts o’ curious 
fowl and every outlandish critter he could 
lay his hands on. ’T stands to reason he 
couldn’t run that rig many years. Your 
goin's on here made me think o’ Mason. 
He cut a wide swath for a time. 

‘‘Wall, I hope you’ll come off better’n 
he did. He sunk such a pile that he got 
discouraged and took to drink ; then his 
wife, a mighty likely woman she is (one o’ 
the Batchelders of Dull Corner), couldn’t 


Auctions. 


33 


stand it and went back to her old home, 
and he died ragged and friendless about 
a month ago. Ef I’s you, I’d go over, 
just to take warning and hold up in 
time.” 



3 


CHAPTER III. 


BUYING A HORSE. 

“And you know this Deacon Elkins to be a 
thoroughly reliable man in every respect ? ” 

“ Indeed, I do," said honest Nathan Robbins. 
“ He is the very soul of honor ; couldn’t do a mean 
thing. I’d trust him with all I have.” 

“ Well, I’m glad to hear this, for I’m just going to 
buy a horse of him.” 

“ A horse ? ” 

“ Yes — a horse !” 

“ Then I don’t know anything about him ! ” 

A True Tale. 

After furnishing my house in the afore- 
said economical and nondescript fashion, 
came the trials of “ planting time.” This 
was such an unfragrant and expensive 
period that I pass over it as briefly as 
possible. I saw it was necessary in con- 
formity with the appalling situation to 
alter one vowel in my Manorial Hall. 
The haul altogether amounted to eight- 


Buying cl ijorsc. 


35 


een loads besides a hundred bags of vile- 
ly smelling fertilizers. Agents for every 
kind of phosphates crowded around me, 
descanting on the needs of the old land, 
until I began to comprehend what the 
owner meant by “ keeping it up.” With 
Gail Hamilton, I had supposed the entire 
land of this earth to be pretty much 
the same age until I adopted the “ aban- 
' doned.” This I found was fairly senile 
in its worthless decrepitude. 

My expenditure was something prodig- 
ious. 

Yes, “planting time” was a night- 
mare in broad daylight, but as I look 
back, it seems a rosy dream, compared 
with the prolonged agonies of buying a 
horse ! 

All my friends said I must have a 
horse to truly enjoy the country, and it 
seemed a simple matter to procure an 
animal for my own use. 

Livery-stable keepers, complaisant and 


36 &bojitiug an ^bcmboneb farm. 


cordial, were continually driving around 
the corner into my yard, with a tremen- 
dous flourish and style, chirking up old 
by-gones, drawing newly painted buggies, 
patched-up phaetons, two-seated second- 
hand “ Democrats,” high wagons, low 
chaises, just for me to try. They all said 
that seeing I was a lady and had just 
come among ’em, they would trade easy 
and treat me well. Each mentioned the 
real value, and a much lower price, at 
which I, as a special favor, could secure 
the entire rig. Their prices were all 
abominably exorbitant, so I decided to 
hire for a season. The dozen beasts tried 
in two months, if placed in a row, would 
cure the worst case of melancholia. 
Some shied ; others were liable to be 
overcome by “ blind staggers three had 
the epizootic badly, and longed to lie 
down ; one was nearly blind. At last I 
was told of a lady who desired to leave 
her pet horse and Sargent buggy in some 


Baling a ^orsc. 


37 


country home during her three months’ 
trip abroad. 

Both were so highly praised as just the 
thing that I took them on faith. 

I judge that a woman can lie worse 
than a man about a horse ! 

“You will love my Nellie” she wrote. 
“ I hate to part with her, even for the 
summer. She has been a famous racer in 
Canada — can travel easily twenty-five 
miles a day. Will go better at the end of 
the journey than at the beginning. I 
hear you are an accomplished driver, so 
I send my pet to your care without 
anxiety.” 

I sent a man to her home to drive out 
with this delightful treasure, and pictured 
myself taking long and daily drives over 
our excellent country roads. Nellie, 
dear Nellie; I loved her already. How 
I would pet her, and how fond she 
would become of me. Two lumps of su- 
gar at least, every day for her, and red 


38 dimpling an ^banboncb ihmtt. 


ribbons for the whip. How she would 
dash along ! A horse for me at last ! 
About 1.45 a. m., of the next day, a 
carriage was heard slowly entering the 
yard. I could hardly wait until morning 
to gloat over my gentle racer ! At early 
dawn I visited the stable and found John 
disgusted beyond measure with my bar- 
gain. A worn-out, tumble-down, rickety 
carriage with wobbling wheels, and an 
equally worn-out, thin, dejected, venera- 
ble animal, with an immense blood spavin 
on left hind leg, recently blistered ! It 
took three weeks of constant doctoring, 
investment in Kendall’s Spavin Cure, and 
consultation with an expensive veterinary 
surgeon, to get the whilom race horse 
into a condition to slowly walk to market. 
I understood now the force of the one 
truthful clause — “ She will go better at the 
end of the drive than at the beginning,” 
for it was well-nigh impossible to get her 
stiff legs started without a fire kindled 


Ihttnng a $0rse. 


39 


under them and a measure of oats held 
enticingly before her. It was enraging, 
but nothing to after experiences. All the 
disappointed livery men, their complai- 
sance and cordiality, wholly a thing of 
the past, were jubilant that I had been so 
imposed upon by some one, even if they 
had failed. And their looks, as they 
wheeled rapidly by me, as I crept along 
with the poor, suffering, limping “ Nellie,” 
were almost more than I could endure. 

Horses were again brought for inspec- 
tion, and there was a repetition of previ- 
ous horrors. At last a man came from 
Mossgrown. He had an honest face ; he 
knew of a man who knew of a man whose 
brother had just the horse for me, “ sound, 
stylish, kind, gentle as a lamb, fast as the 
wind.” Profiting by experience, I said I 
would look at it. Next day, a young 
man, gawky and seemingly unsophisti- 
cated, brought the animal. It looked 
well enough, and I was so tired. He was 


40 ^bopting an &banboncb farm. 


anxious to sell, but only because he was 
going to be married and go West ; needed 
money. And he said with sweet simpli- 
city : “ Now I ain’t no jockey, I ain’t ! 
You needn’t be afeard of me — I say just 
what I mean. I want spot cash, I do, and 
you can have horse, carriage, and harness 
for $125 down. He gave me a short 
drive, and we did go “like the wind.” I 
thought the steed very hard to hold in, 
but he convinced me that it was not so. 
I decided to take the creature a week on 
trial, which was a blow to that guileless 
young man. And that very afternoon I 
started for the long, pleasant drive I had 
been dreaming about since early spring. 

The horse looked quiet enough, but I 
concluded to take my German domestic 
along for extra safety. I remembered his 
drawling direction, “ Doan’t pull up the 
reins unless you want him to go pretty 
lively,” so held the reins rather loosely 
for a moment only, for this last hope 


String a ijorse. 


41 


wheeled round the corner as if possessed, 
and after trotting, then breaking, then 
darting madly from side to side, started 
into a full run. I pulled with all my 
might; Gusta stood up and helped. No 
avail. On we rushed to sudden death. 
No one in sight anywhere. With one Her- 
culean effort, bred of the wildest despair, 
we managed to rein him in at a sharp right 
angle, and we succeeded in calming his 
fury, and tied the panting, trembling 
fiend to a post. Then Gusta mounted 
guard while I walked home in the heat 
and dirt, fully half a mile to summon 
John. 

I learned that that horse had never be- 
fore been driven by a woman. He evi- 
dently was not pleased. 

Soon the following appeared among the 
local items of interest in the Gooseville 
Clarion : 

Uriel Snooks, who has been working in the 
cheese factory at Frogville, is now to preside over 


42 ^bopting cm ^banboncb .farm. 


chair number four in Baldwin’s Tonsorial Estab- 
lishment on Main Street. 

Kate Sanborn is trying another horse. 

These bits of information in the papers 
were a boon to the various reporters, but 
most annoying to me. The Bungtown 
Gazetteer announced that “ a well-known 
Boston poetess had purchased the Britton 
Farm, and was fitting up the old home- 
stead for city boarders ! ” I couldn’t im- 
port a few hens, invest in a new dog, or 
order a lawn mower, but a full account 
would grace the next issue of all the 
weeklies. I sympathized with the old 
woman who exclaimed in desperation : 

“Great Jerusalem, ca’nt I stir, 

Without a-raisin’ some feller’s fur?’’ 

At last I suspected the itinerant butcher 
of doing double duty as a reporter, and 
found that he “ was engaged by several 
editors to pick up bits of news for the 
press ” as he went his daily rounds. “ But 


Buying a fjorse. 


43 


this,” I exclaimed, “ is just what I don’t 
want and can’t allow. Now if you 
should drive in here some day and dis- 
cover me dead, reclining against yonder 
noble elm, or stark at its base, surrounded 
by my various pets, don’t allude to it in 
the most indirect way. I prefer the fu- 
neral to be strictly private. Moreover, if 
I notice another ‘ item ’ about me, I’ll buy 
of your rival.” And the trouble ceased. 

But the horses ! Still they came and 
w r ent. I used to pay my friend the rubi- 
cund surgeon to test some of these highly 
recommended animals in a short drive 
with me. 

One pronounced absolutely unrivaled 
was discovered by my wise mentor to be 
“ watch-eyed,” “ rat-tailed,” with a swol- 
len gland on the neck, would shy at a 
stone, stand on hind legs for a train, with 
various other minor defects. I grew faint- 
hearted, discouraged, cynical, bitter. Was 
there no horse for me ? I became town- 


44 ^bopting an &banboneb -farm. 


talk as “ a drefful fussy old maid who did- 
n’t know her own mind, and couldn’t be 
suited no way.” 

I remember one horse brought by a 
butcher from West Bungtown. It was, in 
the vernacular, a buck-skin. Hide-bound, 
with ribs so prominent they suggested a 
wash-board. The two fore legs were well 
bent out at the knees ; both hind legs were 
swelled near the hoofs. His ears nearly 
as large as a donkey’s; one eye covered 
with a cataract, the other deeply sunken. 
A Roman nose, accentuated by a wide 
stripe, aided the pensive expression of his 
drooping under lip. He leaned against 
the shafts as if he were tired. 

“ There, Marm,” said the owner, eying 
my face as an amused expression stole 
over it ; “ ef you don’t care for style, ef ye 
want a good, steddy critter, and a critter 
that can go, and a critter that any lady can 
drive, there's the critter for ye ! ” 

I did buy at last, for life had become 


Busing a Ijorse. 


45 


a burden. An interested neighbor (who 
really pitied me ?) induced me to buy a 
pretty little black horse. I named him 
“ O. K.” 

After a week I changed to “ N. G.” 

After he had run away, and no one 
would buy him, “ D. B.” 

At last I succeeded in exchanging this 
shying and dangerous creature for a mel- 
ancholy, overworked mare at a livery sta- 
ble. I hear that “ D. B.” has since killed 
two /-talians by throwing them out when 
not sufficiently inebriated to fall against 
rocks with safety. 

And my latest venture is a backer. 

Horses have just as many disagreeable 
traits, just as much individuality in their 
badness, as human beings. Under kind 
treatment, daily petting, and generous 
feeding, “ Dolly ” is too frisky and head- 
strong for a lady to drive. 

“ Sell that treacherous beast at once or 
you will be killed,” writes an anxious 


46 ^bopting ait &banboncb .farm. 


friend who had a slight acquaintance 
with her moods. 

I want now to find an equine reliance 
whose motto is “Nulla vestigia retror- 
sum,” or “No steps backward.” 

I have pasted Mr. Hale’s famous motto, 
“ Look forward and not back,” over her 
stall — but with no effect. The “ Lend a 
Hand ” applies to those we yell for when 
the backing is going on. 

By the way, a witty woman said the 
other day that men always had the ad- 
vantage. A woman looked back and was 
turned into a pillar of salt ; Bellamy looked 
back and made sixty thousand dollars. 

Mr. Robert B. Roosevelt, in his amus- 
ing book “ Five Acres too Much ” gives 
even a more tragic picture, saying : “ My 
experience of horseflesh has been various 
and instructive. I have been thrown 
over their heads and slid over their tails; 
have been dragged by saddle, stirrups, 
and tossed out of wagons. I have had 


Buying a Ijorse. 


47 


them to back and to kick, to run and to 
bolt, to stand on their hind feet and kick 
with their front, and then reciprocate by 
standing on their front and kicking with 
their hind feet. ... I have been thrown 
much with horses and more by them.” 

“ Horses are the most miserable creat- 
ures, invariably doing precisely what 
they ought not to do ; a pest, a nuisance, 
a bore.” Or, as some one else puts it : 

“A horse at its best is an amiable 
idiot ; at its worst, a dangerous maniac.” 


CHAPTER IV. 


FOR THOSE WHO LOVE PETS. 

“ All were loved and all were regretted, but life 
is made up of forgetting.” 

“ The best thing which a man possesses is his 
dog.” 

When I saw a man driving into my 
yard after, this, I would dart out of a 
back door and flee to sweet communion 
with my cows. 

On one such occasion I shouted back 
that I did not want a horse of any vari- 
ety, could not engage any fruit trees, did 
not want the place photographed, and 
was just going out to spend the day. I 
was courteously but firmly informed that 
my latest visitor had, singular to relate, 
no horse to dispose of, but he “ would 
like fourteen dollars for my dog tax for 
the current year ! ” As he was also sher- 


Sox tljose rol)0 Cooe JJcts. 49 


iff, constable, and justice of the peace, I 
did not think it worth while to argue the 
question, although I had no more thought 
of being called up to pay a dog tax than 
a hen tax or cat tax. I trembled, lest I 
should be obliged to enumerate my en- 
tire menagerie — cats, dogs, canaries, rab- 
bits, pigs, ducks, geese, hens, turkeys, 
pigeons, peacocks, cows, and horses. 

Each kind deserves an entire chapter, 
and how easy it would be to write of cats 
and their admirers from Cambyses to 
Warner ; of dogs and their friends from 
Ulysses to Bismarck. I agree with Ik 
Marvel that a cat is like a politician, sly 
and diplomatic ; purring — for food; and 
affectionate — for a consideration ; really 
caring nothing for friendship and devo- 
tion, except as means to an end. Those 
who write books and articles and verse 
and prose tributes to cats think very dif- 
ferently, but the cats I have met have 
been of this type. 

4 


50 &bojJtittg an &batibcmci> .farm. 


And dogs. Are they really so affec- 
tionate, or are they also a little shrewd in 
licking the hand that feeds them ? I dis- 
like to be pessimistic. But when my 
dogs come bounding to meet me for a 
jolly morning greeting they do seem ex- 
pectant and hungry rather than affection- 
ate. At other hours of the day they 
plead with loving eyes and wagging tails 
for a walk or a seat in the carriage or 
permission to follow the wagon. 

But I will not analyze their motives. 
They fill the house and grounds with life 
and frolic, and a farm would be incom- 
plete if they were missing. Hamerton, in 
speaking of the one dog, the special pet 
and dear companion of one’s youth, ob- 
serves that “the comparative shortness 
of the lives of dogs is the only imperfec- 
tion in the relation between them and 
us. If they had lived to three-score and 
ten, man and dog might have traveled 
through life together, but, as it is, we 


fox tfjose tol )0 £ovc J)cts. 5 1 


must either have a succession of affec- 
tions, or else, when the first is buried in 
its early grave, live in a chill condition of 
dog-less-ness.” 

I thank him for that expressive com- 
pound word. Almost every one might, 
like Grace Greenwood and Gautier, write 
a History of my Pets and make a readable 
book. Carlyle, the grand old growler, 
was actually attached to a little white 
dog — his wife’s special delight, for whom 
she used to write cute little notes to the 
master. And when he met with a fatal 
accident, he was tenderly nursed by both 
for months, and when the doctor was at 
last obliged to put him out of pain by 
prussic acid, their grief was sincere. 
They buried him at the top of the garden 
in Cheyne Row, and planted cowslips 
round his grave, and his mistress placed a 
stone tablet, with name and date, to mark 
the last resting place of her blessed 
dog. 


52 Qlboptinig an Qibanboncb farm. 


“ I could not have believed,” writes 
Carlyle in the Memorials, “ my grief then 
and since would have been the twentieth 
part of what it was — nay, that the want 
of him would have been to me other than 
a riddance. Our last midnight walk to- 
gether (for he insisted on trying to come), 
January 31st, is still painful to my thought. 
Little dim, white speck of life, of love, of 
fidelity, girdled by the darkness of night 
eternal.” 

Beecher said many a good thing about 
dogs, but I like this best : Speaking of 
horseback riding, he incidentally re- 
marked that in evolution, the human door 
was just shut upon the horse, but the dog 
got fully up before the door was shut. 
If there was not reason, mirthfulness, 
love, honor, and fidelity in a dog, he did 
not know where to look for it. Oh, if 
they only could speak, what wise and hu- 
morous and sarcastic things they would 
say ! Did you never feel snubbed by an 


fox tfjose to 1)0 toot Jkts. 53 


immense dog you had tried to patronize ? 
And I have seen many a dog smile. Bay- 
ard Taylor says: “I know of nothing 
more moving, indeed semi-tragic, than 
the yearning helplessness in the face of 
a dog, who understands what is said to 
him, and can not answer ! ” 

Dr. Holland wrote a poem to his dog 
Blanco, “ his dear, dumb friend,” in which 
he expresses what we all have felt many 
times. 


I look into your great brown eyes, 

Where love and loyal homage shine, 

And wonder where the difference lies 
Between your soul and mine. 

The whole poem is one of the best 
things Holland ever did in rhyme. He 
was ambitious to be remembered as a 
poet, but he never excelled in verse un- 
less he had something to express that was 
very near his heart. He was emphati- 
cally the Apostle of Common Sense. 


54 ^bopting an &banboneb .farm. 


How beautifully he closes his loving trib- 
ute — 

Ah, Blanco, did I worship God 
As truly as you worship me, 

Or follow where my Master trod 
With your humility, 

Did I sit fondly at his feet 
As you, dear Blanco, sit at mine, 

And watch him with a love as sweet, 

My life would grow divine ! 

Almost all our great men have more 
than one dog in their homes. When I 
spent a day with the Quaker poet at Dan- 
vers, I found he had three dogs. Roger 
Williams, a fine Newfoundland, stood on 
the piazza with the questioning, patron- 
izing air of a dignified host ; a bright-faced 
Scotch terrier, Charles Dickens, peered at 
us from the window, as if glad of a little 
excitement ; while Carl, the graceful grey- 
hound, was indolently coiled up on a 
shawl and took little notice of us. 

Whittier has also a pet cow, favorite 
and favored, which puts up her handsome 


fox tl]os e tolio Cone flets. 55 


head for an expected caress. The kindly 
hearted old poet, so full of tenderness for 
all created things, told me that years 
when nuts were scarce he would put 
beech nuts and acorns here and there as 
he walked over his farm, to cheer the 
squirrels by an unexpected find. 

Miss Mitford’s tribute to her defunct 
doggie shows to what a degree of imbe- 
cility an old maid may carry fondness for 
her pets, but it is pathetically amusing. 

“ My own darling Mossy’s hair, cut off 
after he was dead by dear Drum, August 
22, 1819. He was the greatest darling 
that ever lived (son of Maria and Mr. 
Webb’s ‘ Ruler,’ a famous dog given him 
by Lord Rivers), and was, when he died, 
about seven or eight years old. He was 
a large black dog, of the largest and 
strongest kind of greyhounds; very fast 
and honest, and resolute past example ; 
an excellent killer of hares, and a most 
magnificent and noble-looking creature. 


56 ^boptittg an &banboneb farm. 


His coat was of the finest and most 
glossy black, with no white, except a very 
little under his feet (pretty white shoe 
linings I used to call them) — a little 
beautiful white spot, quite small, in the 
very middle of his neck, between his chin 
and his breast — and a white mark on his 
bosom. His face was singularly beauti- 
ful; the finest black eyes, very bright, 
and yet sweet, and fond, and tender — 
eyes that seemed to speak ; a beautiful, 
complacent mouth, which used sometimes 
to show one of the long white teeth at 
the side; a jet black nose; a brow which 
was bent and flexible, like Mr. Fox’s, and 
gave great sweetness and expression, and 
a look of thought to his dear face. 
There never was such a dog ! His tem- 
per was, beyond comparison, the sweet- 
est ever known. Nobody ever saw him 
out of humor. And his sagacity was 
equal to his temper. Thank God, he 
went off without suffering. He must 


-for tljose toiler fLovt JJJcto. 57 


have died in a moment. I thought I 
should have broken my heart when I 
came home and found what had hap- 
pened. I shall miss him every moment 
of my life ; I have missed him every in- 
stant to-day — so have Drum and Granny. 
He was laid out last night in the stable, 
and this morning we buried him in the 
middle plantation on the house side of 
the fence, in the flowery corner, between 
the fence and Lord Shrewsbury’s fields. 
We covered his dear body with flowers; 
every flower in the garden. Everybody 
loz^ed him ; * dear saint,’ as I used to 
call him, and as I do not doubt he now 
is! ! No human being was ever so faith- 
ful, so gentle, so generous, and so 
fond ! I shall never love anything half 
so well. 

“ It will always be pleasant to me to 
remember that I never teased him by pet- 
ting other things, and that everything I 
had he shared. He always ate half my 


58 ^bopting an ^banboneb farm. 


breakfast, and the very day before he 
died I fed him all the morning with fil- 
berts.” (There may have been a con- 
nection between the filberts and the fu- 
neral.) 

“ While I had him, I was always sure of 
having one who would love me alike in 
riches or poverty, who always looked at 
me with looks of the fondest love, always 
faithful and always kind. To think of 
him was a talisman against vexing 
thoughts. A thousand times I have said, 
‘ I want my Mossy,’ when that dear 
Mossy was close by and would put his 
dear black nose under my hand on hear- 
ing his name. God bless you, my Mossy! 
I cried when you died, and I can hardly 
help crying whenever I think of you. 
All who loved me loved Mossy. He had 
the most perfect confidence in me — al- 
ways came to me for protection against 
any one who threatened him, and, thank 
God, always found it. I value all things 


.for tljose rol)o £ooe pets. 


59 


he had lately or ever touched ; even the 
old quilt that used to be spread on my 
bed for him to lie on, and which we 
called Mossy’s quilt ; and the pan that he 
used to drink out of in the parlor, and 
which was always called Mossy’s pan, 
dear darling! 

“ I forgot to say that his breath was 
always sweet and balmy ; his coat al- 
ways glossy like satin ; and he never 
had any disease or anything to make 
him disagreeable in his life. Many oth- 
er things I have omitted ; and so I 
should if I were to write a whole vol- 
ume of his praise ; for he was above 
all praise, sweet angel ! I have inclosed 
some of his hair, cut off by papa af- 
ter his death, and some of the hay on 
which he was laid out. He died Satur- 
day, the 2 1 st of August, 1819, at Ber- 
tram House. Heaven bless him, beloved 
angel ! ” 

It is as sad as true that great natures 


60 ^opting an Qlbanbtmeb .farm. 


are solitary* and therefore doubly value 
the affections of their pets. 

Southey wrote a most interesting biog- 
raphy of the cats of Greta Hall, and on 
the demise of one wrote to an old friend : 
“Alas! Grosvenor, this day poor old 
Rumpel was found dead, after as long 
and as happy a life as cat could wish for 
— if cats form wishes on that subject. 
There should be a court mourning in Cat- 
land, and if the Dragon wear a black 
ribbon round his neck, or a band oi 
crape, a la militaire , round one of the 
fore paws, it will be but a becoming 
mark of respect. As we have not cata- 
combs here, he is to be decently interred 
in the orchard and catnip planted on 
his grave.” 

And so closes this catalogue of South- 
ey’s “ Cattery.” 

But, hark ! my cats are mewing, dogs 
all calling for me — no — for dinner ! After 
all, what is the highest civilization but 


£ox tl)ose toljo £ouc JJete. 61 


a thin veneer over natural appetites ? 
What would a club be without its chefs , 
a social affair without refreshment, a 
man without his dinner, a woman without 
her tea? Come to think of it, I’m hun- 
gry myself ! 


V 


CHAPTER V. 


STARTING A POULTRY FARM. 

If every hen should only raise five broods yearly 
of ten each, and there were ten hens to start with, 
at the end of two years they would number 344,760, 
after the superfluous roosters were sold ; and then, 
supposing the extra eggs to have paid for their keep- 
ing and the produce to be worth only a dollar and a 
half a pair, there would be a clear profit of $258,520. 
Allowing for occasional deaths, this sum might be 
stated in round numbers at a quarter of a million, 
which would be a liberal increase from ten hens. 
Of course I did not expect to do as well as this, but 
merely mention what might be done with good luck 
and forcing. Robert Roosevelt. 

Having always heard, on the best au- 
thority, that there was “ money in hens,* 
I invested largely in prize fowls secured at 
State fairs and large poultry shows, buy- 
ing as many kinds as possible to make 
an effective and brilliant display in their 
“ runs.” 


Starting a poultry ,farm. 63 


There is a good deal of money in my hens 
— how to get it back is the present prob- 
lem. These hens were all heralded as fa- 
mous layers ; several did lay in the trav- 
eling coops on the journey, great pinky- 
brown beauties, just to show what they 
could do if they chose, then stopped 
suddenly. I wrote anxiously to former 
owners of this vaunted stock to ex- 
plain such disappointing behavior. Some 
guessed the hens were just moulting, oth- 
ers thought “ may be they were broody ” ; 
a few had the frankness to agree with me 
that it was mighty curious, but hens al- 
ways were “ sorter contrary critters.” 

Their appetites remained normal, but, 
as the little girl said of her pet bantam, 
they only lay about doing nothing. And 
when guests desired some of my fine fresh 
eggs boiled for breakfast, I used to go 
secretly to a neighbor and buy a dozen, 
but never gave away the mortifying sit- 
uation. 


6 4 &b 0 jjtittg an &banbonei> farm. 


Seeing piles of ducks’ eggs in a farmer's 
barn, all packed for market, and pictur- 
ing the producers, thirty white Pekins, a 
snowy, self - supporting fleet on my re- 
formed lakelet, I bought the whole lot, and 
for long weary months they were fed and 
pampered and coaxed and reasoned with, 
shut up, let out, kept on the water, for- 
bidden to go to it, but not one egg to be 
seen ! 

It was considered a rich joke in that 
locality that a city woman who was try- 
ing to farm, had applied for these ducks 
just as they had completed their labors 
for the season of i 888-*9 o ; they were 
also extremely venerable, and the reticent 
owner rejoiced to be relieved of an ex- 
pensive burden at good rates. Knowing 
nothing of these facts in natural history, 
I pondered deeply over the double phe- 
nomenon. I said the hens seemed normal 
only as to appetite ; the ducks proved 
abnormal in this respect. They were al- 


Starting a JJouitrs ifarm. 65 


ways coming up to the back door, clam- 
oring for food — always unappeased. They 
preferred cake, fresh bread, hot boiled 
potatoes, doted on tender bits of meat, 
but would gobble up anything and every- 
thing, more voracious and less fastidious 
than the ordinary hog of commerce. 
Bags of corn were consumed in a flash, 
“ shorts ” were never long before their 
eager gaze, they went for every kind of 
nourishment provided for the rest of the 
menagerie. A goat is supposed to have a 
champion appetite and digestion, but a 
duck — at least one of my ducks — leaves a 
goat so far behind that he never could 
regain his reputation for omniverosity. 
They were too antique to be eaten them- 
selves — their longevity entitled them to 
respect ; they could not be disposed of 
by the shrewdest market man to the least 
particular of boarding-house providers ; I 
could only regard them with amazement 
and horror and let them go on eating 
5 


66 &i> 0 jiting an &banboneb farm. 


me out of house and home and purse- 
strings. 

But at last I knew. I asked an honest 
man from afar, who called to sell some- 
thing, why those ducks would not lay a 
single egg. He looked at them critically 
and wrote to me the next day : 

“ Dear Madam : The reason your 
ducks won’t lay is because they’re too 
old to live and the bigest part of ’em is 
drakes. Respectfully, 

Jonas Hurlbert.” 

I hear that there are more ducks in the 
Chinese Empire than in all the world out- 
side of it. They are kept by the Celes- 
tials on every farm, on the private and 
public roads, on streets of cities, and on 
all the lakes, ponds, rivers, streams, and 
brooks in the country. That is the secret 
of their lack of progress. What time 
have they to advance after the ducks are 
fed and cared for ? No male inhabitant 


Starting a floititrg ,£arm. 67 


could ever squeeze out a leisure half- 
hour to visit a barber, hence their long 
queues. 

About this time the statement of Mr. 
Crankin, of North Yeaston, Rhode Island, 
that he makes a clear and easy profit of 
five dollars and twenty cents per hen 
each year, and nearly forty-four dollars 
to every duck, and might have increased 
said profit if he had hatched, rather than 
sold, seventy-two dozen eggs, struck me 
as wildly apocryphal. Also that caring 
for said hens and ducks was merely an 
incident of his day’s work on the large 
farm, he working with his laborers. 
Heart -sick and indignant, contrasting 
his rosy success with my leaden - hued 
failure, I decided to give all my ducks 
away, as they wouldn’t, couldn’t drown, 
and there would be no use in killing 
them. But no one wanted them ! And 
everybody smiled quizzically when I pro- 
posed the gift. 


68 &bopting cm &bani>oneb .farm. 


Just then, as if in direct sarcasm, a 
friend sent me a paper with an item 
marked to the effect that a poor young 
girl had three ducks’ eggs given her as 
the basis of a solid fortune, and actually 
cleared one hundred and eighteen dollars 
from those three eggs the first year. 

Another woman solemnly asserts in 
print a profit of $448.69 from one hun- 
dred hens each year. 

The census man told me of a woman 
who had only eighteen hens. They gave 
her sixteen hundred and ninety eggs, of 
which she sold eighteen dollars’ worth, 
leaving plenty for household use. 

And my hens and my ducks! In my 
despair I drove a long way to consult a 
“ duck man.” He looked like the typical 
Brother Jonathan, only with a longer 
beard, and his face was haggard, un- 
kempt, anxious. He could scarcely stop 
to converse, evidently grudged the time, 
devotes his entire energies from dawn to 


Starting a Poultry .farm. 69 


twilight to slaving for his eight hundred 
ducklings. He also kept an incubator 
going all the time. 

“ Do ducks pay you ? ” I asked. 

“Wall, I’m gettin’ to be somewhat of a 
bigotist,” he said ; “ I barely git a livin’.” 

“ Why Mr. Crankin — ” I began. 

The name roused his jealous ire, and 
his voice, a low mumble before, now burst 
into a loud roar. “Yes, Crankin makes 
money, has a sight o’ incubators, makes 
’em himself, sells a lot, but some say they 
don’t act like his do when they git off his 
place; most on ’em seem possessed, but 
Crankin, he can manage ’em and makes 
money too.” 

“ Do your ducks lay much ? ” 

“ Lay ! I don’t want ’em to lay ! Sell 
’em all out at nine weeks, ’fore the pin 
feathers come; then they’re good eatin’ 
— for them as likes ’em. I’ve heard of 
yure old lot. Kill ’em, I say, and start 
new ! ” 


70 ^boptittg an &banboncb .farm. 


“ Crankin says — ” 

“ I don’t care nothing what Crankin 
says” (here the voice would have filled a 
cathedral), “I tell ye; me and Crankin’s 
two different critters! ” 

So I felt ; but it would not do to give 
up. I purchased an expensive incubator 
and brooder — needn’t have bought a 
brooder. I put into the incubator at a 
time when eggs were scarce and high 
priced, two hundred eggs — hens’ eggs, 
ducks’ eggs, goose eggs. The tempera- 
ture must be kept from 102° to 104°. 
The lamps blazed up a little on the first 
day, but after that we kept the heat ex- 
actly right by daily watching and night 
vigils. It engrossed most of the time of 
four able-bodied victims. 

Nothing ever was developed. The 
eggs were probably cooked that first 
day ! 

Now I’m vainly seeking for a pur- 
chaser for my I. and B. Terms of sale 


Starting a Poultry iFarrn. 


7i 


very reasonable. Great reduction from 
original price; shall no doubt be forced 
to give them away to banish painful rec- 
ollections. 

I also invested in turkeys, geese, and 
peacocks, and a pair of guinea hens to 
keep hawks away. 

For long weary months the geese 

r 

seemed the only fowls truly at home on 
my farm. They did their level best. 
Satisfied that my hens would neither lay 
nor set, I sent to noted poultry fanciers 
for “ settings ” of eggs at three dollars 
per thirteen, then paid a friendly “hen 
woman ” for assisting in the mysterious 
evolution of said eggs into various inter- 
esting little families old enough to be 
brought to me. 

Many and curious were the casualties 
befalling these young broods. Chickens 
are subject to all the infantile diseases of 
children and many more of their own, 
and mine were truly afflicted. Imprimis , 


72 ^bopting an Qtbanboneb i^rm. 


most would not hatch ; the finest Brahma 
eggs contained the commonest barn-yard 
fowls. Some stuck to the shell, some were 
drowned in a saucer of milk, some perished 
because no lard had been rubbed on their 
heads, others passed away discouraged by 
too much lard. Several ate rose bugs 
with fatal results; others were greedy as 
to gravel and agonized with distended 
crops till released by death. They had 
more “ sand ” than was good for them. 
They were raised on “ Cat Hill,” and five 
were captured by felines, and when the 
remnant was brought to me they disap- 
peared day by day in the most puzzling 
manner until we caught our mischievous 
pug, “Tiny Tim,” holding down a beau- 
tiful young Leghorn with his cruel paw 
and biting a piece out of her neck. 

So they left me, one by one, like the 
illusions of youth, until there was no 
“survival of the fittest.” 

In a ragged old barn opposite, a hen 


Starting a poultry farm. 7 3 


had stolen her nest and brought out sev- 
enteen vigorous chicks. I paid a large 
bill for the care of what might have been 
a splendid collection, and meekly bought 
that faithful old hen with her large fami- 
ly. It is now a wonder to me that any 
chickens arrive at maturity. Fowls are 
afflicted with parasitic wrigglers in their 

t 

poor little throats. The disease is called 
“ gapes,” because they try to open their 
bills for more air until a red worm in the 
trachea causes suffocation. This horrid 
red worm, called scientifically Scelorostoma 
syngamus , destroys annually half a million 
of chickens. 

Dr. Crisp, of England, says it would be 
of truly national importance to find the 
means of preventing its invasion. 

The unpleasant results of hens and 
garden contiguous, Warner has described. 
They are incompatible if not antagonistic. 
One man wisely advises: “Fence the 
garden in and let the chickens run, as the 


74 ^bopting an &banbanel> .farm. 


man divided the house with his quarrel- 
some wife, by taking the inside himself 
and giving her the outside, that she might 
have room according to her strength.” 

Looking over the long list of diseases 
to which fowls are subject is dispiriting. 
I am glad they can’t read them, or they 
would have all at once, as J. K. Jerome, 
the witty playwright, decided he had ev- 
ery disease found in a medical dictionary, 
except housemaid’s knee. Look at this 
condensed list : 

Diseases of Nervous System. — i. 
Apoplexy. 2. Paralysis. 3. Vertigo. 4. 
Neuralgia. 5. Debility. 

Diseases of Digestive Organs. — 99. 

Diseases of Locomotive Organs. — 
1. Rheumatism. 2. Cramp. 3. Gout. 4. 
Leg weakness. 5. Paralysis of legs. 6. 
Elephantiasis. 

Next, diseases caused by parasites. 

Then, injuries. 

Lastly, miscellaneous. 


Starting a flonltrg farm. 75 


I could add a still longer list of unclas- 
sified ills : Homesickness, fits, melan- 
cholia, corns, blindness from fighting too 
much, etc. 

Now that I have learned to raise chick- 
ens, it is a hard and slow struggle to get 
any killed. I say in an off-hand manner, 
\vith assumed nonchalance: “Ellen, I 
want Tom to kill a rooster at once for to- 
morrow’s dinner, and I have an order 
from a friend for four more, so he must 
select five to-night.” Then begins the 
trouble. “Oh,” pleads Ellen, “don’t kill 
dear Dick ! poor, dear Dick ! That is 
Tom’s pet of all ; so big and handsome 
and knows so much ! He will jump up on 
Tom’s shoulder and eat out of his hand 
and come when he calls — and those big 
Brahmas — don’t you know how they were 
brought up by hand, as you might say, 
and they know me and hang around the 
door for crumbs, and that beauty of a 
Wyandock, you couldn't eat him ! ” When 


76 &b0pting an &banboneb .farm. 


the matter is decided, as the guillotining 
is going on, Ellen and I sit listening to 
the axe thuds and the death squaks, while 
she wrings her hands, saying : “ O dearie 
me ! What a world — the dear Lord ha’ 
mercy on us poor creatures ! What a 
thing to look into, that we must kill the 
poor innocents to eat them. And they 
were so tame and cunning, and would fol- 
low me all around ! ” Then I tell her of 
the horrors of the French Revolution to 
distract her attention from the present 
crisis, and alluded to the horrors of canni- 
balism recently disclosed in Africa. Then 
I fall into a queer reverie and imagine 
how awful it would be if we should ever 
be called to submit to a race of beings as 
much larger than we are as we are above 
the fowls. I almost hear such a monster 
of a house-wife, fully ninety feet high, 
say to a servant, looking sternly and crit- 
ically at me : 

“ That fat, white creature must be 


Starting a Ponitrg .farm. 


77 


killed; just eats her old head off — will 
soon be too tough” — Ugh! Here Tom 
comes with five headless fowls. Wasn’t 
that a wierd fancy of mine ? 

Truly “Me and Crankin’s two different 
critters.” 

From the following verse, quoted from 
4 recent poultry magazine, I conclude that 
I must be classed as a “ chump.” As it 
contains the secret of success in every 
undertaking, it should be committed to 
memory by all my readers. 

“ Grit makes the man, 

The want of it the chump. 

The men who win, 

Lay hold, hang on, and hump.” 


CHAPTER VI. 


GHOSTS. 

“ But stop,” says the courteous and prudent 
reader, “ are there any such things as ghosts ? ” 

“ Any ghostesses ! ” cries Superstition, who set- 
tled long since in the country, near a church yard 
on a “ rising ground,” “ any ghostesses ! Ay, man, 
lots on 'em ! Bushels on ’em ! Sights on ’em ! 
Why, there’s one as walks in our parish, reglar as 
the clock strikes twelve — and always the same 
round, over church- stile, round the corner, through 
the gap, into Shorts Spinney, and so along into our 
close, where he takes a drink at the pump — for ye 
see he died in liquor, and then arter he squenched 
hisself, wanishes into waper. 

“ Then there’s the ghost of old Beales, as goes o’ 
nights and sows tares in his neighbor’s wheat — I’ve 
often seed ’em in seed time. They do say that Black 
Ben, the poacher, have riz, and what’s more, walked 
slap through all the squire’s steel traps, without 
springing on ’em. And then there’s Bet Hawkey as 
murdered her own infant — only the poor little babby 
hadn’t learned to walk, and so can’t appear ag’in her.” 

Thomas Hood, The Grimsby Ghost. 

That dark little room I described as 
so convenient during a terrific thunder- 


<&l)0StS. 


79 


storm or the prowling investigations of a 
burglar, began after a while to get mys- 
terious and uncanny, and I disliked, nay, 
dreaded to enter it after dark. It was so 
still, so black, so empty, so chilly with a 
sort of supernatural chill, so silent, that 
imagination conjured up sounds such as I 
had never heard before. I had been told 
of an extremely old woman, a great-great- 
grandmother, bed-ridden, peevish, and 
weak-minded, who had occupied that 
room for nearly a score of years, appar- 
ently forgotten by fate, and left to drag 
out a monotonous, weary existence on 
not her “ mattress grave ” (like the poet 
Heine), but on an immensely thick feather 
bed ; only a care, a burden, to her rela- 
tions. 

As twilight came on, I always carefully 
closed that door and shut the old lady in 
to sleep by herself. For it seemed that 
she was still there, still propped up in an 
imaginary bed, mumbling incoherently of 


8o ^bcpting an ^banbaneb .farm. 


the past, or moaning out some want, or 
calling for some one to bring a light, as 
she used to. 

Once in a while, they told me, she 
would regain her strength suddenly and 
astonish the family by appearing at the 
door. When the grand-daughter was en- 
joying a Sunday night call from her 
“ intended ” it was rather embarrassing. 

I said nothing to my friends about this 
unpleasant room. But several were sus- 
ceptible to the strange influence. One 
thought she should not mind so much if 
the door swung open, and a portiere con- 
cealed the gloom. So a cheerful cretonne 
soon was hung. Then the fancy came 
that'the curtain stirred and swayed as if 
some one or something was groping fee- 
bly with ghostly or ghastly fingers behind 
it. And one night, when sitting late and 
alone over the embers of my open fire, 
feeling a little forlorn, I certainly heard 
moans coming from that direction. 


0l)OStS. 


81 


It was not the wind, for, although it was 
late October and the breezes were sighing 
over summer’s departure, this sound was 
entirely different and distinct. Then (and 
what a shiver ran down my back !) I re- 
membered hearing that a woman had 
been killed by falling down the steep cel- 
lar stairs, and the spot on the left side 
where she was found unconscious and 
bleeding had been pointed out to me. 
There, I heard it again ! Was it the 
wraith of the aged dame or the cries of 
that unfortunate creature? Hush! El- 
len can’t have fallen down ! 

I am really scared ; the lamp seems to 
be burning dim and the last coal has gone 
out. Is it some restless spirit, so un- 
happy that it must moan out its weary 
plaint ? I ought to be brave and go at 
once and look boldly down the cellar 
stairs and draw aside that waving por- 
tiere . Oh, dear ! If I only had some one 

to go with me and hold a light and — 
6 


82 &bopting an ^banboneb farm. 


there it is — the third time. Courage van- 
ished. It might be some dreadful tramp 
hiding and trying to drive me up-stairs, 
so he could get the silver, and he would 
gladly murder me for ten cents — 

“Tom,” I cried. “Tom, come here.” 
But Tom, my six-footer factotum, made 
no response. 

I could stand it no longer — the por- 
tiere seemed fairly alive, and I rushed out 
to the kitchen where Ellen sat reading 
the Ledger, deep in the horrors of The 
Forsaken Inn. “Ellen, I’m ashamed, but 
I’m really frightened. I do believe some- 
body is in that horrid dark room, or in 
the cellar, and where is Tom ? 

“ Bedad, Miss, and you’ve frightened 
the heart right out o’ me. It might be a 
ghost, for there are such things (Heaven 
help us!), and I’ve seen ’em in this coun- 
try and in dear old Ireland, and so has 
Tom.” 

“ You’ve seen ghosts ? ” 


(Boosts. 


83 


“Yes, indeed, Miss, but I’ve never spoke 
to any, for you've no right to speak to a 
ghost, and if you do you will surely die.” 
Tom now came in and soon satisfied me 
that there was no living thing in the dark- 
ness, so I sat down and listened to Ellen’s 
experiences with ghosts. 

, The Former Mrs. Wilkes. — “Now 
this happened in New York city, Miss, in 
West 28th Street, and is every word true, 
for, my dear, I saw it with my own eyes. 
I went to bed, about half-past nine it was 
this night, and I was lying quietly in bed, 
looking up to the ceiling; no light on ac- 
count of the mosquitoes, and Maud, the 
little girl I was caring for, a romping dear 
of seven or eight, a motherless child, had 
been tossing about restless like, and her 
arm was flung over me. All at once I 
saw a lady standing by the side of the 
bed in her night dress and looking ear- 
nestly at the child beyond me. She then 
came nearer, took Maud’s arm off me, 


84 Qlbopting an Qibanbancb i^arm. 


and gently straightened her in bed, then 
stroked her face, both cheeks — fondly, you 
know — and then stood and looked at the 
child. I said not a word, but I wasn’t one 
bit afraid for I thought it was a living 
lady. I could tell the color of her eyes 
and hair and just how she looked every 
way. In the morning I described her to 
Mrs. Wilkes, and asked, ‘ Is there any 
strange lady in the house?’ ‘No, Ellen. 
Why ? ’ she said. Then I said : ‘ Why, 
there certainly was a pleasant-looking 
lady in my room last night, in her night 
dress, and she patted Maud as if she 
thought a sight of her.’ 

“‘Why,’ said my mistress, ‘that is sure- 
ly the former Mrs. Wilkes ! ’ 

“ She said that the older daughter had 
seen her several times standing before her 
glass, fixing her hair and looking at her- 
self, but if she spoke to her or tried to 
speak, her mother would take up some- 
thing and shake it at her. And once when 


®t)06tS. 


85 


we were going up-stairs together Alice 
screamed, and said that her mother was 
at the top of the stairs and blew her 
cold breath right down on her. The step- 
mother started to give her her slipper, but 
the father pitied her and would not allow 
her to be whipped, and said ‘ I’ll go up to 
bed with you, Alice.’ ” 

“ Did you ever see the lady in white 
again, Ellen?” 

“ Never, Ma’am, nor did I ever see any 
other ghost in this country that I was sure 
was a ghost, but — Ireland, dear old Ire- 
land, oh, that’s an ancient land, and they 
have both ghosts and fairies and banshees 
too, and many’s the story I’ve heard over 
there, and from my own dear mother’s 
lips, and she would not tell a lie (Heaven 
rest her soul !), and I’ve seen them myself 
over there, and so has Tom and his broth- 
er too, Miss. Oh, many’s the story I 
could tell ! ” 

“ Well, Ellen, let me have one of your 


86 &bopting an &banboncb .farm. 


own — your very best.” And I went for 
pencil and pad. 

“ And are ye going to pin down my 
story. Well, Miss, if ye take it just as I 
say, and then fix it proper to be. read, 
they’ll like it, for people are crazy now to 
get the true ghost stories of dear old Ire- 
land. O Miss, when you go over, don’t 
forget my native place. It has a real 
castle and a part of it is haunted, and the 
master doesn’t like to live there — only 
comes once a year or so, for hunting — and 
the rabbits there are as thick as they can 
be and the river chuck full of fish, but no 
one can touch any game, or even take out 
one fish, or they would be punished.” 

“ Yes, Ellen it’s hard, and all wrong, but 
we are wandering away from your ghosts, 
and you know I am going to take notes. 
So begin.” 

“ Well, Miss, I was a sort of companion 
or maid to a blind lady in my own town. 
I slept in a little room just across the 


<&f)O0t0. 


87 


landing from hers, so as to always be 
within reach of her. I was just going to 
bed, when she called for me to come in 
and see if there was something in the 
room — something alive, she thought, that 
had been hopping, hopping all around her 
bed, and frightened her dreadfully, poor 
thing, for, you remember, she was stone 
blind, Miss, which made it worse. So I 
hurried in and I shook the curtains, 
looked behind the bureau and under the 
bed, and tried everywhere for whatever 
might be hopping around, but could find 
nothing and heard not a sound. While I 
was there all was still. Then I went into 
my room again, and left the door open, as 
I thought Miss Lacy would feel more 
comfortable about it, and I was hardly 
in my bed when she called again and 
screamed out with fear, for It was hopping 
round the bed. She said I must go down- 
stairs and bring a candle. So I had to 
go down-stairs to the pantry all alone 


88 Olbopting cm &bcmb 0 tteb ^arttt. 


and get the candle. Then I searched as 
before, but found nothing — not a thing. 
Well, my dear, I went into my room and 
kept my candle lighted this time. The 
third time she called me she was stand- 
ing on her pillow, shivering with fright, 
and begged me to bring the light. It was 
sad, because she was stone blind. She 
told me how It went hopping around the 
room, with its legs tied like. And after 
looking once more and finding nothing, 
she said I’d have to sleep in the bed with 
her and bring a chair near the bed and 
put the lighted candle on it. For a long 
time we kept awake, and watched and 
listened, but nothing happened, nothing 
appeared. We kept awake as long as we 
could, but at last our eyes grew very 
heavy, and the lady seemed' to feel more 
easy. So I snuffed out the candle. Out 
It hopped and kept a jumping on one leg 
like from one side to the other. We 
were so much afraid we covered our 


©l)00tS. 


89 


faces; we dreaded to see It, so we hid 
our eyes under the sheet, and she clung 
on to me all shaking; she felt worse be- 
cause she was blind. 

“We fell asleep at daylight, and when 
I told Monk, the butler, he said it was a 
corpse, sure — a corpse whose legs had 
been tied to keep them straight and the 
cords had not been taken off, the feet not 
being loosened. Why my own dear moth- 
er, that’s dead many a year (Heaven bless 
her departed spirit !) — she would never tell 
a word that was not true — she saw a ghost 
hopping in that way, tied-like, jumping 
around a bed — blue as a blue bag; just 
after the third day she was buried, and 
my mother (the Lord bless her soul !) told 
me the sons went to her grave and loos- 
ened the cords and she never came back 
any more. Isn’t it awful ? And, bedad, 
Miss, it’s every word true. I can tell you 
of a young man I knew who looked into 
a window at midnight (after he had been 


9© Qlbopting an &banboneb farm. 


playing cards, Miss, gambling with the 
other boys) and saw something awful 
strange, and was turned by ghosts into a 
shadow .” 

This seemed to be a thrilling theme, 
such as Hawthorne would have been able 
to weave into the weirdest of weird tales, 
and I said, “ Go on.” 

“Well, he used to go playing cards 
about three miles from his home with a 
lot of young men, for his mother wouldn’t 
have cards played in her house, and she 
thought it was wicked, and begged him not 
to play. It’s a habit with the young men of 
Ireland — don’t know as it’s the same in 
other countries — and they play for a goose 
or a chicken. They go to some vacant 
house to get away from their fathers, 
they’re so against it at home. Why, my 
brother-in-law used to go often to such a 
house on the side of a country road. Each 
man would in turn provide the candles to 
play by, and as this house was said to be 


©l)0St0. 


91 


haunted, bedad they had it all to them- 
selves. Well, this last night that ever 
they played there — it was Tom’s own 
brother that told me this — just as they 
were going to deal the cards, a tall gen- 
tleman came out from a room that had 
been the kitchen. He walked right up to 
them — he was dressed in black cloth 
clothes, and wore a high black hat— and 
came right between two of the men and 
told them to deal out the cards. They 
were too frightened even to speak, so the 
stranger took the cards himself and dealt 
around to each man. And afterward he 
played with them ; then he looked at ev- 
ery man in turn and walked out of the 
room. As soon as he cleared out of the 
place, the men all went away as quick as 
ever they could, and didn’t stop to put 
out the lights. Each man cleared with 
himself and never stopped to look be- 
hind. And no one cared to play cards in 
that house afterward any more. That 


92 &bojJtittjg an &bcmboncb farm. 


was Tom’s own brother; and now the 
poor young man who was going home at 
midnight saw a light in one of the houses 
by the road, so he turned toward it* 
thinking to light his~pipe. Just before 
knocking, he looked in at the window. 
As soon as he peeped in the light went 
out on him, and still he could see crowds 
of people, as thick as grass, just as you 
see ’em at a fair — so thick they hadn’t 
room to stand — and they kept swaying 
back and forth, courtesying like. The 
kitchen was full, and looking through a 
door he saw a lot more of fine ladies and 
gentlemen ; they were laughing and hav- 
ing great fun, running round the table 
setting out cups and saucers, just as if 
they were having a ball. Just then a big 
side -board fell over with a great crash, 
and all the fine people scampered away, 
and all was dark. So he turned away on 
his heel and was so frightened, his mother 
said, he could hardly get home from fear, 


(Boosts. 


93 


and he had three whole miles to go. 
Next day he was thrashing corn in the 
barn and something upset him and 
pitched him head foremost across the 
flail. He rose, and three times he was 
pitched like that across the flail, so he 
gave up and went home. His mother 
asked him : ‘Johnny, what is the matter 
with you ? You do look very bad ! ’ So 
he up and told her what had happened to 
him in the barn, and what he saw the 
night before. And he took suddenly sick 
and had to keep his bed for nine weeks, 
and when he got up and was walking 
around, he wasn’t himself any more, and 
the sister says to the mother : ‘ Mother, 
I’m sure that it isn’t Johnny that’s there. 
It’s only his shadow, for when I look at 
him, it isn’t his features or face, but the 
face of another thing. He used to be so 
pleasant and cheerful, but now he looks 
like quite another man. Mother,’ said 
she, ‘we haven’t Johnny at all.’ Soon he 


94 &bojiting an ^banbatteb farm. 


got a little stronger and went to the cap- 
ital town with corn. Several other men 
went also to get their corn ground. They 
were all coming home together a very 
cold night, and the men got up and sat 
on their sacks of corn. The other horses 
walked on all right with them, but John- 
ny’s horses wouldn’t move, not one step 
while he was on top of the load. Well, 
my dear, he called for the rest to come 
and help him — to see if the horses would 
go for them. But they would not move 
one step, though they whipped them and 
shouted at them to start on, for Johnny 
he was as heavy as lead. And he had to 
get down. Soon as he got down, the 
horses seemed glad and went off on a 
gallop after the rest of the train. So they 
all went off together, and Johnny wan- 
dered away into the bogs. His friends 
supposed, of course, he was coming on, 
thought he was walking beside his load ; 
the snow was falling down, and perhaps 


(Boosts. 


95 


they were a little afraid. He was left 
behind. They scoured the country for 
him next day, and, bedad, they found him, 
stiff dead, sitting against a fence. There’s 
where they found him. They brought 
him on a door to his mother. Oh, it was 
a sad thing to see — to see her cry and 
hear her mourn ! ” 

“ And what more ? ” I asked. 

“ That’s all. He was waked and buried, 
and that’s what he got for playing cards ! 
And that’s all as true as ever could be 
true, for it’s myself knew the old mother, 
and she told me it her very self, and she 
cried many tears for her son.’* 


CHAPTER VII. 


DAILY DISTRACTIONS. 

But the sheep shearing came, and the hay season 
next, and then the harvest of small corn . . . then 
the sweating of the apples, and the turning of the 
cider mill and the stacking of the firewood, and 
netting of the wood-cocks, and the springes to be 
mended in the garden and by the hedgerows, where 
the blackbirds hop to the molehills in the white Oc- 
tober mornings and gray birds come to look for 
snails at the time when the sun is rising. It is won- 
derful how Time runs away when all these things, 
and a great many others, come in to load him down 
the hill, and prevent him from stopping to look about. 
And I, for my part, can never conceive how people 
who live in towns and cities, where neither lambs nor 
birds are (except in some shop windows), nor growing 
corn, nor meadow grass, nor even so much as a stick 
to cut, or a stile to climb and sit down upon — how 
these poor folk get through their lives without being 
utterly weary of them, and dying from pure indolence, 
is a thing God only knows, if his mercy allows him 
to think of it. Lorna Doone. 

A farm-house looks on the outside like 
a quiet place. No men are seen about, 


fcDaiij] EDistracticms. 


97 


front windows are closely shaded, front 
door locked. Go round to the back door; 
nobody seems to be at home. If by 
chance you do find, after long bruising of 
knuckles, that you have roused an inmate, 
it is some withered, sad-faced old dame, 
who is indifferent and hopelessly deaf, or 
a bare-footed, stupid urchin, who stares 
as if you had dropped from another 
planet, and a cool “ Dunno ” is the sole 
response to all inquiries. 

All seems at a dead standstill. In 
reality everything and everybody is going 
at full speed, transpiring and perspiring 
to such a degree that, like a swiftly whirl- 
ing top, it does not appear to move. 

Friends think of me as not living, but 
simply existing, and marvel that I can 
endure such monotony. On the contrary, 
I live in a constant state of excite- 
ment, hurry, and necessity for immediate 
action. 

The cows were continually getting out 

7 


<)£ &bojjting cut ^bcntboncb farm . 


of pasture and into the corn ; the pigs, like 
the chickens, evinced decided preference 
for the garden. The horse would break 
his halter and dart down the street, or, if 
in pasture, would leap the barbed-wire 
fence, at the risk of laming his legs for 
life, and dash into a neighbor’s yard where 
children and babies were sunning on the 
grass. 

Rival butchers and bakers would drive 
up simultaneously from different direc- 
tions and plead for patronage and instant 
attention. 

The vegetables must be gathered and 
carried to market ; every animal was rav- 
enously hungry at all hours, and didn’t 
hesitate to speak of it. The magnificent 
peacock would wander off two miles, 
choosing the railroad track for his ram- 
bles, and loved to light on Si Evans’s 
barn ; then a boy must be detailed to re- 
cover the prize bird, said boy depending 
on a reward. His modest-hued consort 


©ailn Ulistractions. 


99 


would seek the deep hedges back of a 
distant swamp. 

Friends would come from a distance to 
surprise and cheer me in my lonely re- 
treat just at the time that the butter 
must positively be made, while the flowers 
were choking for water, smothered with 
weeds, “ pus’ley,” of course, pre-eminent. 
Then a book agent would appear, blind, 
but doubly persistent, with a five-dollar 
illustrated volume recounting minutely 
the Johnstown horror. And one of my 
dogs would be apt at this crisis to pursue 
and slay a chicken or poison himself with 
fly-paper. Every laboring man for miles 
around would come with an air of great 
importance to confidentially warn me 
against every other man that could be 
employed, with the stereotyped phrase in 
closing: “Well, whatever you do” (as if 
I might be left to do anything) “ don’t 
hire John Smallpate or Bill Storer. I’ve 
known him, man and boy, for thirty 


ioo &bopting an &banboncir farm. 


years ; you’ll do well not to trust 
him/” 

Yet these same men who had so villi- 
fied each other could be seen nightly 
lounging in front of the grocery, dis- 
cussing politics and spitting in sweet 
unison. 

The general animosity of my entire 
family to each other caused constant in- 
terruptions. 

“ Sandy,” the handsome setter, loathed 
the pug, and tried to bite his neck in a 
fatal way. He also chased the rabbits, 
trod on young turkeys so that they were 
no more, drove the cat out of the barn 
and up a tree, barked madly at the cows, 
enraging those placid animals, and doted 
on frightening the horse. 

The cat allowed mice to roam mer- 
rily through the grain bins, preferring 
robins and sparrows, especially young 
and happy mothers, to a proper diet ; was 
fond of watching the chickens with wick- 


Daih) Distractions. 


IOI 


ed, malicious, greedy, dangerous eyes, 
and was always ready to make a sly 
spring for my canaries. 

The rabbits (pretty innocent little creat- 
ures I had thought them, as I gazed at 
their representatives of white canton flan- 
nel, solidly stuffed, with such charming 
eyes of pink beads) girded all my young 
trees and killed them before I dreamed of 
such mischief, nibbled at every tender 
sprout, every swelling bud, were so agile 
that they could not be captured, and be- 
came such a maddening nuisance that I 
hired a boy to take them away. I fully 
understand the recent excitement of the 
Australians over the rabbit scourge which 
threatened to devastate their land. 

The relations were strained between 
my cows ; mother and daughter of a noble 
line ; they always fed at opposite corners 
of the field, indulging in serious fights 
when they met. 

My doves ! I am almost ready to say 


io2 &bopting cut ^bcutboncb iFarnt. 


that they were more annoying than all 
the rest of my motley collection, picked 
all seeds out of the ground faster than 
they could be put in, so large spaces 
sowed with rye lay bare all summer, and 
ate most of the corn and grain that was 
intended to fatten and stimulate my 
fowls. 

Doves are poetical and pleasing, pig- 
eons ditto — in literature, and at a safe dis- 
tance from one’s own barn. It’s a pretty 
sight at sunset on a summer’s eve to see 
them poising, wheeling, swirling, round a 
neighbor’s barn. Their rainbow hues 
gleam brightly in the sun as they preen 
their feathers or gently “coo-oo, I love 
oo,” on the ridge pole. I always longed 
to own some, but now the illusion is past. 
They have been admired and petted for 
ages, consecrated as emblems of inno- 
cence and peace and sanctity, regarded 
as almost sacred from the earliest an- 
tiquity. They have been idealized and 


IDailg ^Distractions. 


103 


praised from Noah to Anacreon, both in- 
clined to inebriety ! But in reality they 
are a dirty, destructive, greedy lot, and 
though fanciers sell them at high prices, 
they only command twenty-five cents per 
pair when sold for the market ! 

The hens lost half their feathers, often 
an eye, occasionally a life, in deadly 
feuds. My spunky little bantam game 
cock was always challenging one of my 
monster roosters and laying him low, so 
he had to be sent away. 

John, my eccentric assistant, could 
abide no possible rival, insulted every 
man engaged to help him, occasionally in- 
dulging in a free fight after too frequent 
visits to the cider barrels of my next 
neighbor, so he had to follow the ban- 
tam. 

Another distress was the constant calls 
of natives with the most undesirable 
things for me to buy; two or three calls 
daily for a long time. Boys with eager, 


io4 Qlbopting an ^battboneb .farm. 


ingenuous faces bringing carrier pigeons 
— pretty creatures — and I had been told 
there was money in pigeons. I paid them 
extortionate prices on account of extreme 
ignorance ; and the birds, of course, flew 
home as soon as released, to be bought 
again by some gullible amateur. I had 
omitted to secure the names and ad- 
dresses of these guileless lads. 

A sandy - haired, lisping child with 
chronic catarrh offered me a lot of pet 
rats ! 

“ I hear you like pets,” she said. 
“Well, I’ve got some tame rats, a father 
and mother and thirteen little ones, and 
a mother with four. They’re orful cun- 
ning. Hope you’ll take ’em.” 

A big, red-faced, black-bearded, and 
determined man drove one day into the 
yard with an immense wagon, in which 
was standing a stupid, vicious old goat, 
and almost insisted on leaving it at a 
most ridiculously high price. 


IHaiio distractions. 


105 


“ Heard that the woman that had come 
to live here wanted most every animal 
that Noah got into the ark ; was sure 
she’d like a goat.” It was with consider- 
able difficulty that he could be induced 
to take it away. 

Dogs, dogs, dogs — from mastiff to mon- 
grel, from St. Bernard to toy poodle — 
the yard really swarmed with them just 
before the first of May, when dog taxes 
must be paid ! 

A crow that could talk, but rather ob- 
jectionably, was offered me. 

A pert little boy, surrounded by his 
equally pert mates, said, after coming 
uninvited to look over my assortment : 
“ Got most everything, hain’t ye ? Got a 
monkey ? ” 

Then his satellites all giggled. 

“ No, not yet. Will not you come in ? ” 

Second giggle, less hearty. 

A superannuated clergyman walked 
three miles and a quarter in a heavy rain, 


io 6 &bo;pting ait &banboneb iFarnt. 


minus umbrella, to bring me a large and 
common pitcher, badly cracked and of 
no original value ; heard I was collecting 
old china. Then, after making a long 
call, drew out a tiny package from his 
vest pocket and offered for sale two time- 
worn cheap rings taken from his mother’s 
dead hand. They were mere ghosts of 
rings that had once meant so much of joy 
or sorrow, pathetic souvenirs, one would 
think, to a loving son. He would also 
sell me his late father’s old sermons for 
a good sum ! 

This reminded me of Sydney Smith’s 
remark to an old lady who was sorely 
afflicted with insomnia: “Have you ever 
tried one of my sermons ? ” 

Perhaps I have said enough to prove 
that life in a bucolic solitude may be 
something more varied than is generally — 
“Ellen don’t let that old peddler come 
into the house, say we want nothing, and 
then tell the ladies I’ll be down directly — 


IDaiig JDistrcutions. 


107 


and, O Ellen, call Tom ! Those ducks are 
devouring his new cabbage - plants and 
one of the calves has got over the stone 
wall and — what ? 

“ He’s gone to Dog Corner for the cow- 
doctor.” 

— Yes, more varied than is generally 
supposed ! 


CHAPTER VIII. 


THE PROSE OF NEW ENGLAND FARM LIFE. 

A life whose parlors have always been closed. 

Ik Marvel. 

Sunshine is tabooed in the front room of the house. 
The “ damp dignity ” of the best-room has been well 
described : “ Musty smells, stiffness, angles, absence 
of sunlight. What is there to talk about in a room 
dark as the Domdaniel, except where one crack in a 
reluctant shutter reveals a stand of wax flowers under 
glass, and a dimly descried hostess who evidently 
waits only your departure to extinguish that solitary 
ray ? ” 

At a recent auction I obtained twenty- 
one volumes of State Agricultural Re- 
ports for seventeen cents ; and what I 
read in them of the Advantages of Ru- 
ral Pursuits, The Dignity of Labor, 
The Relation of Agriculture to Longev- 
ity and to Nations, and, above all, of the 


JJrcsc of Ncto Qfnglanb farm Cife. 109 


Golden Egg, seem decidedly florid, un- 
practical, misleading, and very little per- 
manent popularity can be gained by such 
self-interested buncombe from these elo- 
quent orators. 

The idealized farmer, as he is depicted 
by these white-handed rhetoricians who, 
like John Paul, “would never lay hand to 
a plow, unless said plow should actually 
pursue him to a second story, and then 
lay hands on it only to throw it out of 
the window,” and the phlegmatic, over- 
worked, horny-handed tillers of the soil 
are no more alike than Fenimore Coop- 
er’s handsome, romantic, noble, and im- 
pressive red man of the forest and the 
actual Sioux or Apache, as regarded by 
the cowboy of the West. 

It’s all work, wfith no play and no 
proper pay, for Western competition now 
prevents all chance of decent profits. 
Little can be laid up for old age, except 
by the most painful economy and daily 


no 


^boptittg an ^banbotteb farm. 


scrimping ; and how can the children con- 
sent to stay on, starving body and soul ? 
That explains the 3,318 abandoned farms 
in Maine at present. And the farmers’ 
wives! what monotonous, treadmill lives! 
Constant toil with no wages, no allow- 
ance, no pocket money, no vacations, no 
pleasure trips to the city nearest them, 
little of the pleasures of correspondence ; 
no time to write, unless a near relative is 
dead or dying. Some one says that their 
only chance for social life is in going to 
some insane asylum ! There have been 
four cases of suicide in farmers’ families 
near me within eighteen months. 

This does not apply to the fortunate 
farmer who inherited money and is 
shrewd enough to keep and increase it. 
Nor to the market gardener, who raises 
vegetables under glass ; nor to the own- 
ers of large nurseries. These do make a 
good living, and are also able to save 
something. 


Prose of Nero (England jFarm £ife. 


hi 


In general, it is all one steady rush of 
work from March to November ; unceas- 
ing, uncomplaining activity for the barest 
support, followed by three months of 
hibernation and caring for the cattle. 
Horace Greeley said : “ If our most ener- 
getic farmers would abstract ten hours 
each per week from their incessant drudg- 
ery and devote them to reading and re- 
flection in regard to their noble calling, 
they would live to a better purpose and 
bequeath better examples to their chil- 
dren.” 

It may have been true long years ago 
that no shares, factory,, bank, or railroad 
paid better dividends than the plowshare, 
but it is the veriest nonsense now. 

Think of the New England climate in 
summer. Rufus Choate describes it elo- 
quently : “ Take the climate of New Eng- 
land in summer, hot to-day, cold to-mor- 
row, mercury at eighty degrees in the 
shade in the morning, with a sultry wind 


1 1 2 


&bopting an &banboncb iFarrn. 


southwest. In three hours more a sea 
turn, wind at east, a thick fog from the 
bottom of the ocean, and a fall of forty- 
degrees. Now so dry as to kill all the 
beans in New Hampshire, then floods 
carrying off all the dams and bridges on 
the Penobscot and Androscoggin. Snow 
in Portsmouth in July, and the next day 
a man and a yoke of oxen killed by light- 
ning in Rhode Island. You would think 
the world was coming to an end. But we 
go along. Seed time and harvest never 
fail. We have the early and the latter 
rains ; the sixty days of hot corn weather 
are pretty sure to be measured out to us ; 
the Indian summer, with its bland south 
winds and mitigated sunshine, brings all 
up, and about the 25th of November, 
being Thursday, a grateful people gath- 
er about the Thanksgiving board, with 
hearts full of gratitude for the blessings 
that have been vouchsafed to them.” 

Poets love to sing of the sympathy of 


Iprose of Nero (Englonb -farm Cife. n 3 


Nature. I think she is decidedly at: odds 
with the farming interests of the country. 
At any rate, her antipathy to me was 
something intense and personal. That 
mysterious stepmother of ours was really 
riled by my experiments and determined 
to circumvent every agricultural ambition. 

She detailed a bug for every root, 
worms to build nests on every tree, others 
to devour every leaf, insects to attack 
every flower, drought or deluge to ruin 
the crops, grasshoppers to finish every- 
thing that was left. 

Potato bugs swooped down on my 
fields by tens of thousands, and when 
somewhat thinned in ranks by my un- 
ceasing war, would be re-enforced from a 
neighbor’s fields, once actually fording 
my lakelet to get to my precious potato 
patch. The number and variety of de- 
vouring pests connected with each vege- 
table are alarming. Here are a few 
connected closely with the homely cab- 


1 14 ^.bopting an ^banboncb iTarrn. 


bage, as given by a noted helminthologist 
under the head of “ Cut-worms ” : 

“ Granulated,” “ shagreened,” “ white,” 
“ marked,” “ greasy,” “ glassy,” “ speck- 
led,” “ variegated,” “ wavy,” “ striped,” 
“harlequin,” “imbricated,” “tarnished.” 
The “ snout beetle ” is also a deadly foe. 

To realize this horror, this worse than 
Pharaoh plague, you must either try a 
season of farming or peruse octavo vol- 
umes on Insects injurious to Vegetation, 
fully illustrated. 

In those you may gain a faint idea of 
the “skippers,” “stingers,” “soothsayers,” 
“walking sticks or specters,” “saw flies 
and slugs,” “boring caterpillars,” “horn- 
tailed wood wasps,” etc., etc., etc., etc., 
etc. — a never-ending list. The average 
absolute loss of the farmers of this coun- 
try from such pests is fully one million 
dollars per annum. 

Gail Hamilton said of her squashes : 

“ They appeared above-ground, large- 


Prose of New (Knglanb .farm Cife. 115 


lobed and vigorous. Large and vigorous 
appeared the bugs, all gleaming in green 
and gold, like the wolf on the fold, and 
stopped up all the stomata and ate up all 
the parenchyma, till my squash - leaves 
looked as if they had grown for the sole 
purpose of illustrating net-veined organi- 
zations. A universal bug does not indi- 
cate a special want of skill in any one.” 

Not liking to crush the bug between 
thumb and finger as advised, she tried 
drowning them. She says: “ The moment 
they touched the water they all spread 
unseen wings and flew away. I should 
not have been much more surprised to see 
Halicarnassus soaring over the ridge pole. 
I had not the slightest idea they could fly ” 

Then the aphides ! Exhausters of 
strength — vine fretters — plant destroyers ! 
One aphis, often the progenitor of over 
five thousand million aphides in a single 
season. This seems understated, but I 
accept it as the aphidavit of another 


n6 &&opting an ^batiboneb .farm. 


noted helminthologist. I might have im- 
agined Nature had a special grudge 
against me if I had not recalled Emer- 
son’s experience. He says : “ With brow 
bent, with firm intent, I go musing in the 
garden walk. I stoop to pick up a weed 
that is choking the corn, find there were 
two ; close behind is a third, and I reach 
out my arm to a fourth ; behind that there 
are four thousand and one ! 

“ Rose bugs and wasps appear best when 
flying. I admired them most when flying 
away from my garden.” 

Horace Greeley said that “ No man who 
harbors caterpillars has any moral right 
to apples.” But one sees whole orchards 
destroyed in this way for lack of time to 
attack such a big job. Farmers have 
been unjustly attacked by city critics who 
do not understand the situation. There 
was much fine writing last year in regard 
to the sin and shame of cutting down the 
pretty, wild growth of shrubs, vines, and 


Prose of Nc to (£nglani> farm £ife. 117 


flowers along the wayside, so picturesque 
to the summer tourist. The tangle of 
wild grape, clematis, and woodbine is cer- 
tainly pretty, but underneath is sure to be 
found a luxuriant growth of thistle, wild 
carrot, silk weed, mullein, chickweed, tan- 
sy, and plantain, which, if allowed to seed 
and disseminate themselves, would soon 
ruin the best farms. There is a deadly 
foe, an army of foes, hiding under these 
luxuriant festoons and masses of cheerful 
flowers. 

Isn’t it strange and sad and pitiful, that 
it is the summer guest who alone enjoys 
the delights of summering in the coun- 
try ? There is no time for rest, for recre- 
ation, for flowers, for outdoor pleasures, 
for the average farmer and his family. 
You seldom see any bright faces at the 
windows, which are seldom opened — only 
a glimpse here and there of a sad, hag- 
gard creature, peering out for curosity. 
Strange would it be to hear peals of 


n8 ^boptittg an &banboneb irarnt. 


merry laughter; stranger still to see a 
family enjoying a meal on the piazza or 
a game on the grass. As for flowers, they 
are valued no more than weeds ; the 
names of the most common are unknown. 
I asked in vain a dozen people last 
summer, what that flower was called, 
pointing to the ubiquitous Joe Rye weed 
or pink motherwort. At last I asked one 
man, who affected to know everything — 

“ Oh, yes, I know it.” 

“What is it?” I persisted. 

“Well, I know it just as well, but can’t 
just now get the name out.” A pause, 
then, with great superiority : “ I d rather 
see a potato field in full bloom, than all 
the flowers in the world.” 

Perhaps some of Tolstoi’s disciples may 
yet solve the problem of New England’s 
abandoned farms. He believes that ev- 
ery able-bodied man should labor with 
his own hands and in “ the sweat of his 
brow ” to produce his own living direct 


Pro se of Neto (fnglanb .farm £ife. 119 


from the soil. He dignifies agriculture 
above all other means of earning a living, 
and would have artificial employments 
given up. “Back to the land,” he cries; 
and back he really goes, daily working 
with the peasants. But ’tis a solemn, 
almost tragical experience, not much bet- 
ter than the fate of the Siberian exile. 
Rise at dawn ; work till dark ; eat — go to 
bed too tired to read a paper ; — and no 
money in it. 

Let these once prosperous farms be 
given up to Swedish colonies, hard work- 
ing and industrious, who can do better 
here than in their own country and have 
plenty of social life among themselves, or 
let wealthy men purchase half a dozen of 
these places to make a park, or two score 
for a hunting ground — or let unattached 
women of middle age occupy them and 
support themselves by raising poultry. 
Men are making handsome incomes from 
this business — women can do the same. 


i2o ^bopting an &banbcmeb .farm. 


The language of the poultry magazines, 
by the way, is equally sentimental and 
efflorescent with that of the speeches at 
agricultural fairs, sufficiently so to sicken 
one who has once accepted it as reliable, 
as for instance : “ The individual must be 
very abnormal in his tastes if they can not 
be catered to by our feathered tribe." 
“To their owner they are a thing of 
beauty and a joy forever. Their ways 
are interesting, their language fascinat- 
ing, and their lives from the egg to the 
mature fowl replete with constant sur- 
prises." * 

“To simply watch them as they pass 
from stage to stage of development fills 
the mind of every sane person with pleas- 
ure." One poultry crank insists that each 
hen must be so carefully studied that she 
can be understood and managed as an 
individual, and speaks of his hens hav- 


* This clause is true. 


Prose of Nero (£nglctnb .farm Cife. 121 


ing at times an “ anxious nervous ex- 
pression ! ” 

“Yes, it is where the hens sing all the 
day long in the barn-yard that throws off 
the stiff ways of our modern civilization 
and makes us feel that we are home and 
can rest and play and grow young once 
more. How many men and women have 
regained lost health and spirits in keep- 
ing hens, in the excitement of finding and 
gathering eggs ! ” 

“ It is not the natural laying season 
when snows lie deep on field and hill, 
when the frost tingles in sparkling beads 
from every twig, when the clear streams 
bear up groups of merry skaters,” etc. 

After my pathetic experience with 
chickens, who after a few days of downy 
content grew ill, and gasped until they 
gave up the ghost ; ducklings, who pro- 
gressed finely for several weeks, then 
turned over on their backs and flopped 
helplessly unto the end ; or, surviving that 


122 


^opting an &banbottcb .farm. 


critical period, were found in the drink- 
ing trough, “ drowned, dead, because they 
couldn’t keep their heads above water”; 
turkeys who flourished to a certain age, 
then grew feeble and phantom-like and 
faded out of life, I weary of gallinaceous 
rhodomontade, and crave “ pointers ” for 
my actual needs. 

I still read “ Crankin’s ” circulars with 
a thrill of enthusiasm because his facts 
are so cheering. For instance, from his 
latest: “We have some six thousand 
ducklings out now, confined in yards 
with wire netting eighteen inches high. 
The first lot went to market May ioth 
and netted forty cents per pound. These 
ducklings were ten weeks old and dressed 
on an average eleven pounds per pair. 
One pair dressed fourteen pounds.” 
Isn’t that better than selling milk at two 
and a half cents per quart ? And no 
money can be made on vegetables unless 
they are raised under glass in advance of 


JJrcse of K'ctu (Englcmb farm £ife. 123 


the season. I know, for did I not begin 
with “ pie plant,” with which every mar- 
ket was glutted, at one cent per pound, 
£nd try the entire list, with disgustingly 
low prices, exposed to depressing com- 
parison and criticism ? When endeavor- 
ing to sell, one of the visiting butchers, 
in reply to my petition that he would 
buy some of my vegetables, said: “Well 
now, Marm, you see just how it is; I’ve 
got more’n I can sell now, and women 
keep offering more all the way along. I 
tell ’em I can’t buy ’em, but I’ll haul 'em 
off for ye if ye want to get rid of ’em ! ” 
So much for market gardening at a dis- 
tance from city demands. 

But ducks ! Sydney Smith, at the close 
of his life, said he “ had but one illusion 
left, and that was the Archbishop of Can- 
terbury.” I still believe in Crankin and 
duck raising. Let me see : “ One pair 
dressed fourteen pounds, netted forty 
cents per pound.” I’ll order one of 


i24 Qlbopting cm QUrnttboneb .farm. 


Crankin’s “ Monarch ” incubators and be- 
gin a poultry farm anew. 

“ Dido et dux," and so do Boston epi- 
cures. I’ll sell at private sales, not for 
hotels ! I used to imagine myself sup- 
plying one of the large hotels and saw 
on the menu ; 

“ Tame duck and apple sauce (from the 
famous ‘Breezy Meadows’ farm).” But 
I inquired of one of the proprietors what 
he would give, and “ fifteen cents per 
pound for poultry dressed and delivered ” 
gave me a combined attack x)f chills and 
hysterics. 

Think of my chickens, from those prize 
hens (three dollars each ) — my chickens, 
fed on eggs hard boiled, milk, Indian 
meal, cracked corn, sun-flower seed, oats, 
buckwheat, the best of bread, selling at 
fifteen cents per pound, and I to pay ex- 
press charges! Is there, is there any 
“ money in hens ? ” 

To show how a child would revel in a 


JJrose of 78 c to (Englcmir Jarm £ife. 125 


little rational enjoyment on a farm, read 
this dear little poem of James Whitcomb 
Riley’s : 


AT AUNTY’S HOUSE. 

One time when we’s at aunty’s house — 
’Way in the country — where 

They’s ist but woods and pigs and cows. 
An’ all’s outdoors and air ! 

An orchurd swing ; an’ churry trees, 

An’ churries in ’em ! Yes, an’ these 

Here red-head birds steal all they please 
An’ tech ’em if you dare ! 

W’y wunst, one time when we wuz there, 
We et out on the porch ! 

Wite where the cellar door wuz shut 
The table wuz ; an’ I 

Let aunty set by me an’ cut 
My wittles up — an’ pie. 

Tuz awful funny ! I could see 
The red heads in the churry tree ; 

An’ bee-hives, where you got to be 
So keerful going by ; 

An’ comp’ny there an’ all ! An’ we— 

We et out on the torch ! 

An’ — I ist et p' surves an’ things 
'At ma don’t ’low me to — 

An’ chickun gizzurds (don’t like wings 
Like parunts does, do you ?) 


126 ^bopting cm ^battbonsb Jarrn. 


An’ all the time the wind blowed there 
An’ I could feel it in my hair, 

An’ ist smell clover ever’where ! 

An’ a old red head flew 
Purt’ nigh wite over my high chair, 
When we et out on the porch ! 


CHAPTER IX. 


THE PASSING OF THE PEACOCKS. 

I would rather look at a peacock than eat him. 

The feathers of an angel and the voice of a devil. 

The story of this farm would not be 
complete without a brief rehearsal of my 
experiences, exciting, varied, and tragic, 
resulting from the purchase of a magnifi- 
cent pair of peacocks. 

My honest intention on leasing my 
forty-dollars-a-year paradise was simply 
to occupy the quaint old house for a sea- 
son or two as a relief from the usual 
summer wanderings. I would plant noth- 
ing but a few hardy flowers of the old- 
fashioned kind — an economical and pro- 
longed picnic. In this way I could easily 
save in three years sufficient funds to 
make a grand tour du monde . 

That was viy plan / 


128 ^boptittg an Qlbanbottcb farm. 


For some weeks I carried out this reso- 
lution, until an event occurred, which 
changed the entire current of thought, 
and transformed a quiet, rural retreat 
into a scene of frantic activity and gigan- 
tic undertaking. 

In the early summer I attended a 
poultry show at Rooster, Mass., and, in 
a moment of impulsive enthusiasm, was 
so foolish as to pause and admire and 
long for a prize peacock, until I was fair- 
ly and hopelessly hypnotized by its brill- 
iant plumage. 

I reasoned : Anybody can keep hens, 
“ me and Crankin ” can raise ducks, 
geese thrive naturally with me, but a 
peacock is a rare and glorious possession. 
The proud scenes he is associated with 
in mythology, history, and art rushed 
through my mind with whirlwind rapidity 
as I stood debating the question. The 
favorite bird of Juno — she called the me- 
tallic spots on its tail the eyes of Argus — 


®l)c passing of tlje peacocks. 129 


imported by Solomon to Palestine, essen- 
tially regal. Kings have used peacocks 
as their crests, have worn crowns of their 
feathers. Queens and princesses have 
flirted gorgeous peacock fans; the pav- 
an, a favorite dance in the days of Louis 
le Grand, imitated its stately step. In 
the days of chivalry the most solemn 
oath was taken on the peacock’s body, 
roasted whole and adorned with its gay 
feathers, as Shallow swore “ by cock and 
pie.” I saw the fairest of all the fair 
dames at a grand mediaeval banquet 
proudly bearing the bird to the table. 
The woman who hesitates is lost. I 
bought the pair, and ordered them boxed 
for “ Breezy Meadows.” 

On the arrival of the royal pair at my 
’umble home, all its surroundings be- 
gan to lose the charm of rustic sim- 
plicity, and appear shabby, inappropri- 
ate, and unendurable. It became evi- 
dent that the entire place must be raised, 
9 


130 ^boptittg an &banbaneb -farm. 


and at once, to the level of those pea- 
cocks. 

The house and barn were painted (co- 
lonial yellow) without a moment’s delay. 
An ornamental piazza was added, all the 
paths were broadened and graveled, and 
even terraces were dreamed of, as I re- 
called the terraces where Lord Beacons- 
field’s peacocks used to sun themselves 
and display their beauties — Queen Vic- 
toria now has a screen made of their 
feathers. 

My expensive pets felt their degrada- 
tion in spite of my best efforts and deter- 
mined to sever their connection with such 
a plebeian place. 

Beauty (I ought to have called him Ab- 
salom or Alcibiades), as soon as let out of 
his traveling box, displayed to an admir- 
ing crowd a tail so long it might be 
called a “ serial,” gave one contemptuous 
glance at the premises, and departed so 
rapidly, by running and occasional flights, 


®l)e passing of tljc peacocks. 131 


that three men and a boy were unable 
to catch up with him for several hours. 
Belle was not allowed her liberty, as we 
saw more trouble ahead: A large yard, 
inclosed top and sides with wire netting, 
at last restrained their roving ambition. 
But they were not happy. Peacocks dis- 
dain a “ roost ” and seek the top of some 
tall tree ; they are also rovers by nature 
and hate confinement. They pined and 
failed, and seemed slowly dying ; so I 
had to let them out. Total cost of pea- 
cock hunts by the boys of the village, 
$11.33. I found that Beauty was happy 
only when admiring himself, or deep in 
mischief. His chief delight was to mount 
the stone wall, and utter his raucous note, 
again and again, as a carriage passed, 
often scaring the horses into dangerous 
antics, and causing severe, if not profane 
criticism. Or he would steal slyly into a 
neighbor’s barn and kill half a dozen 
chickens at a time. He was awake every 


1 3 2 &hopting ait ^baitbaneb Jarm. 


morning by four o’clock, and would an- 
nounce the glories of the coming dawn 
by a series of ear-splitting notes, disturb- 
ing not only all my guests, but the va- 
rious families within range, until com- 
plaints and petitions were sent in. He 
became a nuisance — but how could he be 
muzzled ? 

And he was so gloriously handsome ! 
Visitors from town would come expressly 
to see him. School children would troop 
into my yard on Saturday afternoons, “to 
see the peacock spread his tail,” which 
he often capriciously refused to do. As 
soon as they departed, somewhat dis- 
appointed in “ my great moral show,” 
Beauty would go to a large window on 
the ground floor of the barn and parade 
up and down, displaying his beauties for 
his own gratification. At last he fancied 
he saw a rival in this brilliant, irridescent 
reflection and pecked fiercely at the glass, 
breaking several panes. 


QLt)e passing of tf)e peacocks. 133 


Utterly selfish, he would keep all dainty 
bits for himself, leaving the scraps for his 
devoted mate, who would wait meekly to 
eat what he chose to leave. She made 
up for this wifely self-abnegation by 
frequenting the hen houses. She would 
watch patiently by the side of a hen on 
her nest, and as soon as an egg was de- 
posited, would remove it for her lunch- 
eon. She liked raw eggs, and six were 
her usual limit. 

There is a deal of something closely 
akin to human nature in barn-yard fowls. 
It was irresistibly ludicrous to see the 
peacock strutting about in the sunshine, 
his tail expanded in fullest glory, making 
a curious rattle of triumph as he paraded, 
while my large white Holland turkey 
gobbler, who had been molting severely 
and was almost denuded as to tail feath- 
ers, would attempt to emulate his display, 
and would follow him closely, his wattles 
swelling and reddening with fancied sue- 


i34 ^boptiitg ait ^banbotteb ^antt. 


cess, making all this fuss about what had 
been a fine array, but now was reduced 
to five scrubby, ragged, very dirty rem- 
nants of feathers. He fancied himself 
equally fine, and was therefore equally 
happy. 

Next came the molting period. 

Pliny said long ago of the peacock : 
“ When he hath lost his taile, he hath no 
delight to come abroad,” but I knew 
nothing of this peculiarity, supposing 
that a peacock’s tail, once grown, was a 
permanent ornament. On the contrary, 
if a peacock should live one hundred 
and twenty years (and his longevity is 
something phenomenal) he would have 
one hundred and seventeen new and in- 
teresting tails — enough to start a circulat- 
ing library. Yes, Beauty’s pride and mine 
had a sad fall as one by one the long 
plumes were dropped in road and field 
and garden. He should have been caught 
and confined, and the feathers, all loose 


Qlt)t passing of tlje peacocks. 135 


at once, should have been pulled out at 
one big pull and saved intact for fans 
and dust brushes, and adornment of mir- 
rors and fire-places. Soon every one was 
gone, and the mortified creature now hid 
away in the corn, and behind shrubbery, 
disappearing entirely from view, save as 
hunger necessitated a brief emerging. 

This tailless absentee was not what I 
had bought as the champion prize winner. 
And Belle, after laying four eggs, refused 
to set. But I put them under a turkey, 
and, to console myself and re-enforce my 
position as an owner of peacocks, I began 
to study peacock lore and literature. I 
read once more of the throne of the great- 
est of all the moguls at Delhi, India. 

“ The under part of the canopy is em- 
broidered with pearls and diamonds, with 
a fringe of pearls round about. On the 
top of the canopy, which is made like an 
arch with four panes, stands a peacock 
with his tail spread, consisting all of sap- 


136 Qlbapting an Qtbanboneb iFarm. 


phires and other proper-colored stones ; 
the body is of beaten gold enchased with 
several jewels, and a great ruby upon 
his breast, at which hangs a pearl that 
weighs fifty carats. On each side of the 
peacock stand two nosegays as high as 
the bird, consisting of several sorts of 
flowers, all of beaten gold enameled. 
When the king seats himself upon the 
throne, there is a transparent jewel with 
a diamond appendant, of eighty or nine- 
ty carats, encompassed with rubies and 
emeralds, so hung that it is always in his 
eye. The twelve pillars also that support 
the canopy are set with rows of fair 
pearls, round, and of an excellent water, 
that weigh from six to ten carats apiece. 
At the distance of four feet upon each 
side of the throne are placed two para- 
sols or umbrellas, the handles whereof 
are about eight feet high, covered with 
diamonds ; the parasols themselves are of 
crimson velvet, embroidered and stringed 


®l)e passing of tt)e peacocks. 137 


with pearls.” This is the famous throne 
which Tamerlane began and Shah Jahan 
finished, which is really reported to have 
cost a hundred and sixty million five hun- 
dred thousand livres (thirty-two million 
one hundred thousand dollars). 

I also gloated over the description of 
that famous London dining-room, known 
to the art world as the “ Peacock Room,” 
designed by Whistler. Panels to the 
right and left represent peacocks with 
their tails spread fan-wise, advancing in 
perspective toward the spectator, one be- 
hind the other, the peacocks in gold and 
the ground in blue. 

I could not go so extensively into inte- 
rior decoration, and my mania for mak- 
ing the outside of the house and the 
grounds highly decorative had received 
a severe lesson in the verdict, overheard 
by me, as I stood in the garden, made by 
a gawky country couple who were out for 
a Sunday drive. 


1 38 &bopting an &banboneb .farm. 


As Warner once said to me, “ young love 
in the country is a very solemn thing,” 
and this shy, serious pair slowed up as 
they passed, to see my place. The piaz- 
za was gay with hanging baskets, vines, 
strings of beads and bells, lanterns of all 
hues; there were tables, little and big, 
and lounging chairs and a hammock and 
two canaries. The brightest geraniums 
blossomed in small beds through the 
grass, and several long flower beds were 
one brilliant mass of bloom, while giant 
sun-flowers reared their golden heads the 
entire length of the farm. 

It was gay, but I had hoped to please 
Beauty. 

“ What is that ? ” said the girl, straining 
her head out of the carriage. 

“ Don’t know,” said the youth, “ guess 
it’s a store.” 

The girl scrutinized the scene as a 
whole, and said decisively : 

“ No, ’taint, Bill — it’s a saloon ! ” 


passing of tl)e peacocks. 139 


That was a cruel blow ! I forgot my 
flowers, walked in slowly and sadly and 
carried in two lanterns to store in the 
shed chamber. I also resolved to have 
no more flower beds in front of the 
house, star shaped or diamond — they 
must all be sodded over. 

That opinion of my earnest efforts to 
effect a renaissance at Gooseville — to 
show how a happy farm home should 
look to the passer-by — in short, my 
struggle to “ live up to ” the peacocks 
revealed, as does a lightning flash on a 
dark night, much that I had not per- 
ceived. I had made as great a mistake 
as the farmer who abjures flowers and 
despises “Axin’ up.” 

The pendulum of emotion swung as far 
back, and I almost disliked the innocent 
cause of my decorative folly. I began to 
look over my accounts, to study my 
check books, to do some big sums in ad- 
dition, and it made me even more de- 


140 ^bojUing an &banbotteb farm. 


pressed. Result of these mental exercises 
as follows : Rent, $40 per year ; incidental 
expenses to date, $5,713.85. Was there 
any good in this silly investment of 
mine ? Well, if it came to the very worst, 
I could kill the couple and have a rare 
dish. Yet Horace did not think its flesh 
equal to an ordinary chicken. He wrote: 

I shall ne’er prevail 

To make our men of taste a pullet choose, 

And the gay peacock with its train refuse. 

For the rare bird at mighty price is sold, 

And lo ! what wonders from its tail unfold ! 

But can these whims a higher gusto raise 
Unless you eat the plumage that you praise? 

Or do its glories when ’tis boiled remain ? 

No ; ’tis the unequaled beauty of its train, 

Deludes your eye and charms you to the feast, 
For hens and peacocks are alike in taste. 

Then peacocks have been made useful 
in a medicinal way. The doctors once 
prescribed peacock broth for pleurisy, 
peacocks’ tongues for epilepsy, peacocks’ 
fat for colic, peacocks’ galls for weak 
eyes, peahens’ eggs for gout. 


®l)c passing of tl)c peacocks. 141 


It is always darkest just before dawn, 
and only a week from that humiliating 
Sunday episode I was called by my gar- 
dener to look at the dearest little brown 
something that was darting about in the 
poultry yard. It was a baby peacock, 
only one day old. He got out of the nest 
in some way, and preferred to take care 
of himself. How independent, how capti- 
vating he was ! As not one other egg 
had hatched, he was lamentably, des- 
perately alone, with dangers on every 
side, “ homeless and orphanless.” Some- 
thing on that Sabbath morning recalled 
Melchizedec, the priest without father 
or mother, of royal descent, and of great 
length of days. Earnestly hoping for 
longevity for this feathered mite of 
princely birth, I called him “ Melchizedec.” 

I caught him and was in his toils. 
He was a tiny tyrant ; I was but a slave, 
an attendant, a nurse, a night-watcher. 
Completely under his claw ! 


142 QlbcrjJtinig cm Qtbanboneb farm. 


No more work, no more leisure, no 
more music or tennis ; my life career, my 
sphere, was definitely settled. I was Kiz- 
zie’s attendant — nothing more. People 
have cared for rather odd pets, as the 
leeches tamed and trained by Lord Ers- 
kine ; others have been deeply interested 
in toads, crickets, mice, lizards, alliga- 
tors, tortoises, and monkeys. Wolsey was 
on familiar terms with a venerable carp ; 
Clive owned a pet tortoise; Sir John 
Lubbock contrived to win the affections 
of a Syrian wasp ; Charles Dudley War- 
ner devoted an entire article in the At- 
lantic Monthly to the praises of his cat 
Calvin ; but did you ever hear of a pea- 
cock as a household pet ? 

As it is the correct thing now to lie 
down all of a summer afternoon, hidden 
by trees, and closely watch every move- 
ment of a pair of little birds, or spend 
hours by a frog pond studying the slug- 
gish life there, and as mothers are 


passing of ttje peacocks. 143 


urged by scientific students to record 
daily the development of their infants 
in each apparently unimportant matter, 
I think I may be excused for a brief 
sketch of my charge, for no mother 
ever had a child so precocious, so wise, 
so willful, so affectionate, so persistent, 
as Kizzie at the same age. Before he 
was three days old, he would follow me 
like a dog up and down stairs and all 
over the house, walk behind me as I 
strolled about the grounds, and when 
tired, he would cry and “ peep, weep ” 
for me to sit down. Then he would 
beg to be taken on my lap, thence he 
would proceed to my arm, then my 
neck, where he would peck and scream 
and flutter, determined to nestle there 
for a nap. My solicitude increased as 
he lived on, and I hoped to “ raise ” 
him. He literally demanded every mo- 
ment of my time, my entire attention 
during the day, and, alas ! at night 


144 &bopting ait &battbonei> ifarnt. 


also, until I seemed to be living a tragic 
farce ! 

If put down on carpet or matting, he 
at once began to pick up everything he 
could spy on the floor, and never before 
did I realize how much could be found 
there. I had a dressmaker in the house, 
and Kizzie was always going for a dead- 
ly danger — here a pin, there a needle, 
just a step away a tack or a bit of 
thread or a bead of jet. 

Outdoors it was even worse. With 
two bird dogs ready for anything but 
birds, the pug that had already devoured 
all that had come to me of my expen- 
sive importations, a neighbor’s cat often 
stealing over to hunt for her dinner, a 
crisis seemed imminent every minute. 
Even his own father would destroy him 
if they met, as the peacock allows no 
possible rival. And Kizzie kept so close 
to my heels that I hardly dared step. If 
my days were distracting, the nights 


®!)e passing of tlje peacocks. 145 


were inexpressibly awful. I supposed he 
would be glad to go to sleep in a natural 
way after a busy day. No, indeed ! He 
would not stay in box or basket, or any- 
where but cradled close in my neck. 
There he wished to remain, twittering 
happily, giving now and then a sweet, 
little, tremulous trill, indicative of con- 
tent, warmth, and drowsiness; if I dared 
to move ever so little, showing by a 
sharp scratch from his claws that he pre- 
ferred absolute quiet. One night, when 
all worn out, I rose and put him in a 
hat box and covered it closely, but his 
piercing cries of distress and anger pre- 
vented the briefest nap, reminding me of 
the old man who said, “Yes, it’s pretty 
dangerous livin’ anywheres.” I was so 
afraid of hurting him that I scarcely 
dared move. Each night we had a pro- 
longed battle, but he never gave in for 
one instant until he could roost on my 
outstretched finger or just under my chin. 

10 


146 &i>0pting an ^banboneb .farm. 


Then he would settle down, the conflict 
over, he as usual the victor, and the 
sweet little lullaby would begin. 

One night I rose hastily to close the 
windows in a sudden shower. Kizzie 
wakened promptly, and actually followed 
me out of the room and down-stairs. 
Alas ! it was not far from his breakfast 
hour, for he preferred his first meal at 
four o’clock a. m. You see how he in- 
fluenced me to rise early and take plenty 
of exercise. 

I once heard of a wealthy Frenchman, 
nervous and dyspeptic, who was ordered 
by his eccentric physician to buy a Bar- 
bary ostrich and imitate him as well as 
care for him. And he was quickly cured! 

On the other hand, it is said that ani- 
mals and birds grow to be like those who 
train and pet them. Christopher North 
(John Wilson) used to carry a sparrow in 
his coat pocket. And his friends averred 
that the bird grew so large and impress- 


Qlt)c passing of tl je peacocks. 147 


ive that it seemed to be changing into an 
eagle. 

But Kizzie was the stronger influence. 
I really grew afraid of him, as he liked 
to watch my eyes, and once picked at 
them, as he always picked at any shining 
bit. 

What respect I now feel for a sober, 
steady - going, successful old hen, who 
raises brood after brood of downy dar- 
lings without mishaps ! Her instinct is 
an inspiration. Kizzie liked to perch on 
my finger and catch flies for his dinner. 
How solemn, wise, and bewitching he did 
look as he snapped at and swallowed fif- 
teen flies, uttering all the time a satisfied 
little note, quite distinct from his musical 
slumber song ! 

How he enjoyed lying on one side, 
stretched out at full length, to bask in 
the sun, a miniature copy of his magnifi- 
cent father! Very careful was he of his 
personal appearance, pruning and preen- 


148 &bopiing an &banboncb .farm. 


ing his pretty feathers many times each 
day, paying special attention to his tail — 
not more than an inch long — but what a 
prophecy of the future ! As mothers care 
most for the most troublesome child, so I 
grew daily more fond of cute little Kiz- 
zie, more anxious that he should live. 

I could talk all day of his funny ways, 
of his fondness for me, of his daily in- 
creasing intelligence, of his hair-breadth 
escapes, etc. 

The old story — the dear gazelle expe- 
rience came all too soon. 

Completely worn out with my constant 
vigils, I intrusted him for one night to a 
friend who assured me that she was a 
most quiet sleeper, and that he could rest 
safely on her fingers. I was too tired to 
say no. 

She came to me at daybreak, with poor 
Kizzie dead in her hands. He died like 
Desdemona, smothered with pillows. All 
I can do in his honor has been done by 


$l)e passing of tlje Peacocks. 149 


this inadequate recital of his charms and 
his capacity. After a few days of sincere 
grief I reflected philosophically that if he 
had not passed away I must have gone 
soon, and naturally felt it preferable that 
I should be the survivor. 

A skillful taxidermist has preserved as 
much of Kizzie as possible for me, and 
he now adorns the parlor mantel, a weak, 
mute reminder of three weeks of anxiety. 

And his parents — 

The peahen died suddenly and mys- 
teriously. There was no apparent reason 
for her demise, but the autopsy, which 
revealed a large and irregular fragment 
of window glass lodged in her gizzard, 
proved that she was a victim of Beau- 
ty’s vanity. A friend who was pres- 
ent said, as he tenderly held the glass 
between thumb and finger : “ It is now easy 
to see through the cause of her death ; 
under the circumstances, it would be idle 
to speak of it as pane-less ! ” Beauty 


150 &bopting an ^banboncb farm. 


had never seemed very devoted to her, 
but he mourned her long and sincerely. 
Now that she had gone he appreciated 
her meek adoration, her altruistic devo- 
tion. 

Another touch like human nature. 

And when, after a decent period of 
mourning, another spouse was secured 
for him he refused to notice her and 
wandered solitary and sad to a neigh- 
bor’s fields. The new madam was not 
allowed to share the high roost on the 
elm. She was obliged to seek a less ele- 
vated and airy dormitory. His voice, 
always distressingly harsh, was now so 
awful that it was fascinating. The notes 
seemed cracked by grief or illness. At 
last, growing feebler, he succumbed to 
some wasting malady and no longer 
strutted about in brilliant pre-eminence 
or came to the piazza calling imperiously 
for dainties, but rested for hours in some 
quiet corner. The physician who was 


®I)e JJassing of tljc Pcacorks. 15 1 


called in prescribed for his liver. He 
showed symptoms of poisoning, and I be- 
gan to fear that in his visit to a neigh- 
bor’s potato fields he had indulged in 
Paris green, possibly with suicidal intent. 

There was something heroic in his way 
of dying. No moans, no cries; just a 
dignified endurance. From the western 
window of the shed chamber where he 
lay he could see the multitude of fowls 
below, in the yards where he had so 
lately reigned supreme. Occasionally, 
with a heroic effort, he would get on his 
legs and gaze wistfully on the lively 
crowd so unmindful of his wretchedness, 
then sink back exhausted, reminding me 
of some grand old monarch, statesman, 
or warrior looking for the last time on 
the scenes of his former triumphs. I 
should have named him Socrates. At 
last he was carried to a cool resting 
place in the deep grass, covered with pink 
mosquito netting, and one kind friend 


152 ftbopting an &banboncb .farm. 


after another fanned him and watched 
over his last moments. After he was 
really dead, and Tom with tears rolling 
down his face carried him tenderly away, 
I woke from my ambitious dream and 
felt verily guilty of aviscide. 

But for my vainglorious ambition 
Beauty would doubtless be alive and 
resplendent; his consort, modest hued 
and devoted, at his side, and my 
bank account would have a better show- 
ing. 

There is a motto as follows, “ Let him 
keep peacock to himself,” derived in this 
way : 

When George III had partly recovered 
from one of his attacks, his ministers got 
him to read the king’s speech, but he 
ended every sentence with the word “ pea- 
cock.” 

The minister who drilled him said that 
“ peacock ” was an excellent word for 
ending a sentence, only kings should not 


®l)e passing of tl)c peacocks. 153 


let subjects hear it, but should whisper it 
softly. 

The result was a perfect success; the 
pause at the close of each sentence had 
such a fine elocutionary effect. 

In future, when longing to indulge in 
some new display, yield to another temp- 
tation, let me whisper “ peacock ” and be 
saved. 


CHAPTER X. 


LOOKING BACK. 

Then you seriously suppose, doctor, that garden- 
ing is good for the constitution ? 

I do. For kings, lords, and commons. Grow 
your own cabbages. Sow your own turnips, and if 
you wish for a gray head, cultivate carrots. 

Thomas Hood. 

Conceit is not encouraged in the coun- 
try. Your level is decided for you, and 
the public opinion is soon reported as 
something you should know. 

As a witty spinster once remarked : 
“ It’s no use to fib about your age in 
your native village. Some old woman 
always had a calf born the same night 
you were ! ” 

Jake Corey was refreshingly frank. 
He would give me a quizzical look, shift 
his quid, and begin : 


Cooking Buck. 


*55 


“ Spent a sight o’ money on hens, 
hain’t ye ? Wall, by next year I guess 
you’ll find out whether ye want to quit 
foolin’ with hens or not. Now, my hens 
doan’t git no condition powder, nor sun- 
flower seeds, nor no such nonsense, and I 
ain’t got no bone cutter nor fancy fount- 
ains for ’em ; but I let ’em scratch for 
themselves and have their liberty, and 
mine look full better’n your’n. I’ll give 
ye one p’int. You could save a lot by en- 
gagin’ an old hoss that’s got to be killed. 
I’m allers looking round in the fall of the 
year for some old critter just ready to 
drop. Wait till cold weather, and then, 
when he’s killed, hang half of him up in 
the hen house and see how they’ll pick at 
it. It’s the best feed going for hens, and 
makes ’em lay right along. Doan’t cost 
nothin’ either.” 

I had been asked to give a lecture in a 
neighboring town, and, to change the 
subject, inquired if he thought many 


! 


156 &bo;pting an ^banbotteb farm. 

would attend. Jake looked rather blank, 
took off his cap, scratched his head, and 
then said: 

“ I dunno. Ef you was a Beecher or a 
Gough you could fill the hall, or may be 
ef your more known like, and would talk 
to ’em free, you might git ’em, or if you’s 
going to sing or dress up to make ’em 
larf ; but as 7/V, I dunno.” After the ef- 
fort was over I tried to sound him as to 
my success. He was unusually reticent, 
and would only say: “Wall, the only 
man I heard speak on’t, said ’twas differ- 
ent from anything he ever heard.” This 
reminded me of a capital story told me 
by an old family doctor many years ago. 
It was that sort of anecdote now out of 
fashion with raconteurs — a long preamble, 
many details, a gradual increase of inter- 
est, and a vivid climax, and when told by 
a sick bed would sometimes weary the 
patient. A man not especially well 
known had given a lecture in a New 


Cooking Bock. 


i57 


Hampshire town without rousing much 
enthusiasm in his audience, and as he 
rode away on the top of the stage coach 
next morning he tried to get some sort 
of opinion from Jim Barker, the driver. 
After pumping in vain for a compliment 
the gentleman inquired : “ Did you hear 
nothing about my lecture from any of 
the people ? I should like very much to 
get some idea of how it was received.” 

“Wall, no, stranger, I can’t say as I 
heerd much. I guess the folks was purty 
well pleased. No one seemed to be ag’in 
it but Square Lothrop.” 

“ And may I ask what he said ? ” 

“ Wall, I wouldn’t mind it, if I’se you, 
what he said. He says just what he 
thinks — right out with it, no matter who’s 
hurt — and he usually gets the gist on’t. 
But I wouldn’t mind what he said, the 
public was purty generally pleased.” 
And the long whip lash cracks and Jim 
shouts, “ Get an, Dandy.” 


158 QVbopting ait ^banbottcb ^arttt. 


“Yes,” persisted the tortured man; 
“ but I do want very much to know what 
Squire Lothrop’s opinion was." 

“ Now, stranger, I wouldn’t think any 
more about the Square. He’s got good 
common sense and allers hits the nail on 
the head, but as I said, you pleased ’em 
fust rate." 

“Yes, but I must know what Squire 
Lothrop did say." 

“Wall, if you will have it, he did say 
(and he’s apt to get the gist on’t) he did 
say that he thought ’twas awful shaller ! " 

Many epigrammatic sayings come back 
to me, and one is too good to be omitted. 
An old woman was fiercely criticising a 
neighbor and ended in this way : “ Folks 
that pretend to be somebody, and don’t 
act like nobody, ain’t anybody ! " 

Another woman reminded me of Mrs. 
Partington. She told blood-curdling tales 
of the positive reappearance of departed 
spirits, and when I said, “ Do you really 


Cooking Back. 


T 59 • 


believe all this ? ” she replied, “ Indeed, I 
do, and yet I’m not an imaginary woman ! ” 
Her dog was provoked into a conflict 
with my setters, and she exclaimed : “ Why, 
I never saw him so completely ennervated 

Then the dear old lady who said she 
was a free thinker and wasn’t ashamed of 
it ; guessed she knew as much as the 
minister ’bout this world or the next ; 
liked nothing better than to set down 
Sunday afternoons after she’d fed her 
hens and read Ingersoll. “What books 
of his have you ? ” I asked. 

She handed me a small paper-bound 
volume which did not look like any of 
“Bob’s” productions. It was a Guide 
Book through Picturesque Vermont by 
Ernest Ingersoll ! 

And I must not omit the queer sayings 
of a simple - hearted hired man on a 
friend’s farm. 

Oh, for a photo of him as I saw him one 
cold, rainy morning tending Jason Kib- 


160 &bojiting an &banboneb .farm. 


by’s dozen cows. He had on a rubber 
coat and cap, but his trouser legs were 
rolled above the knee and he was barefoot. 
“Hannibal,” I shouted, “you’ll take cold 
with your feet in that wet grass ! ” 

“ Gueth not, Harm,” he lisped back 
cheerily. “ I never cared for shooth my- 
thelf.” 

He was always shouting across the way 
to inquire if “ thith wath hot enough or 
cold enough to thute me? ” As if I had 
expressed a strong desire for phenomenal 
extremes of temperature. One morning 
he suddenly departed. I met him trudg- 
ing along with three hats jammed on to 
his head and a rubber coat under his arm, 
for ’twas a fine day. 

“ Why, Hanny ! ” I exclaimed, “ where 
are you going in such haste ? ” 

“ Mithter Kibby told me to go to Hali- 
fax, and — I’m going ! ” 

Next, the man who was anxious to go 
into partnership with me. He would 


Backing Back. 


161 


work my farm at halves, or I could buy 
his farm, cranberry bog, and woodland, 
and he would live right on there and run 
that place at halves ; urged me to buy 
twelve or fourteen cows cheap in the fall 
and start a milk route, he to be the active 
partner ; then he had a chance to buy a 
lot of “ essences ” cheap, and if I’d pur- 
chase a peddling-wagon, he’d put in his 
old horse, and we’d go halves on that 
business, or I cbuld buy up a lot of calves 
or young pigs and he’d feed ’em and we’d 
go halves. 

But I will not take you through my 
entire picture-gallery, as I have two 
good stories to tell you before saying 
good-by. 

Depressing remarks have reached me 
about my “ lakelet,” which at first was 
ridiculed by every one. The struggle of 
evolution from the “ spring hole ” was se- 
vere and protracted. Experts were sum- 
moned, their estimates of cost ranging 


ii 


1 62 ^bopting an ^banboncb /arm. 


from four hundred to one thousand dol- 
lars, and no one thought it worth while to 
touch it. It was discouraging. Venerable 
and enormous turtles hid in its muddy 
depths and snapped at the legs of the 
ducks as they dived, adding a limp to the 
waddle ; frogs croaked there dismally ; 
mosquitoes made it a camping ground 
and head center ; big black water snakes 
often came to drink and lingered by the 
edge; the ugly horn pout was the only 
fish that could live there. Depressing, in 
contrast with my rosy dreams ! But now 
the little lake is a charming reality, and 
the boat is built and launched. Turtles, 
pout, lily roots as big as small trees, and 
two hundred loads of “alluvial deposit” 
are no longer “ in it,” while carp are 
promised me by my friend Commissioner 
Blackford. The “Tomtoolan”* is not 
a large body of water — one hundred and 


* Named in honor of the amateur engineers. 


Cooking Back. 


163 


fifty feet long, seventy-five feet wide — 
but it is a delight to me and has been 
grossly traduced by ignorant or envious 
outsiders. The day after the “ Katy-Did ” 
was christened (a flat - bottomed boat, 
painted prettily with blue and gold) I in- 
vited a lady to try it with me. Flags 
were fluttering from stem and stern. We 
took a gayly colored horn to toot as we 
went, and two dippers to bail, if neces- 
sary. It was pot exactly “Youth at the 
prow and Pleasure at the helm,” but we 
were very jolly and not a little proud. 

A neglected knot-hole soon caused the 
boat to leak badly. We had made but 
one circuit, when we were obliged to 
“ hug the shore ” and devote our entire 
energies to bailing. “Tip her a little 
more,” I cried, and the next instant we 
were both rolled into the water. It was 
an absurd experience, and after scram- 
bling out, our clothes so heavy we could 
scarcely step, we vowed, between hys- 


164 QUopting an Qlbanboncb .farm. 


teric fits of laughter, to keep our tip-over 
a profound secret. 

But the next time I went to town, 
friends began to smile mysteriously, 
asked me if I had been out on the lake 
yet, made sly and jocose allusions to a 
sudden change to Baptistic faith, and if I 
cordially invited them to join me in a 
row, would declare a preference for surf 
and salt water, or, if pressed, would mur- 
mur in the meanest way something 
about having a bath-tub at home. 

It is now nearly a year since that little 
adventure, but it is still a subject of 
mirth, even in other towns. A friend 
calling yesterday told me the version he 
had just heard at Gillford, ten miles 
away ! 

“ You bet they have comical goings-on 
at that woman’s farm by the Gooseville 
depot ! She got a regular menagerie, fust 
off — everything she see or could hear of. 
Got sick o’ the circus bizness, and went 


Cooking Back. 


165 


into potatoes deep. They say she was 
actually up and outdoors by day-break, 
working and worrying over the tater 
bugs ! 

“ She’s a red-headed, fleshy woman, and 
some of our folks going by in the cars 
would tell of seeing her tramping up and 
down the long furrows, with half a dozen 
boys hired to help her. Soon as she’d 
killed most of her own, a million more 
just traveled over from the field opposite 
where they had had their own way and 
cleaned out most everything. Then, 
what the bugs spared, the long rains 
rotted. So I hear she’s giv’ up pota- 
toes. 

“Then she got sot on scooping out a 
seven by nine mud hole to make a pond, 
and had a boat built to match. 

“ Well, by darn, she took a stout woman 
in with her, and, as I heerd it, that boat 
just giv’ one groan, and sunk right 
down ! ” 


1 66 QUioptiitg an Qlbanbotteb .farm. 


As to the potatoes, I might never have 
escaped from that terrific thralldom, if a 
city friend, after hearing my woful ex- 
perience, had not inquired quietly : 

“ Why have potatoes ? It’s much cheaper 
to buy all you need ! ” 

I had been laboring under a strange 
spell — supposed I must plant potatoes ; 
the relief is unspeakable. 

Jennie June once said, “The great art 
of life is to eliminate I admired the 
condensed wisdom of this, but, like expe- 
rience, it only serves to illume the path 
over which I have passed. 

One little incident occurred this spring 
which is too funny to withhold. Among 
the groceries ordered from Boston was a 
piece of extra fine cheese. A connoisseur 
in cheese had advised me to try it. It 
recommended itself so strongly that I 
placed it carefully under glass, in a place 
all by itself. It % vas strong — strong 
enough to sew buttons on, strong as 


Cooking Back. 


67 


Sampson, strong enough to walk away 
alone. One warm morning it seemed to 
have gained during the night. Its pene- 
trating, permeating power was something, 
almost supernatural. I carried it from 
one place to another, each time more re- 
mote. It would not be lonely if segre- 
gated, doubtless it had ample social fa- 
cilities within itself ! At last I became 
desperate. “Ellen,” I exclaimed, “just 
bring in tha't cheese and burn it. It 
comes high, too high. I can not endure 
it.” She opened the top of the range 
and, as the cremation was going on, I 
continued my comments. “Why, in all 
my life, I never knew anything like it ; 
wherever I put it — in pantry, swing cup- 
board, on the cellar stairs, in a tin box, 
on top of the refrigerator — way out on 
that — ” Just then Tom opened the door 
and said : 

“ Miss, your fertilizer ’s come ! ” 

I have told you of my mistakes, fail- 


1 68 ^boptiitg an Qibanboneb irarm. 


ures, losses, but have you any idea of my 
daily delights, my lasting gains ? 

From invalidism to health, from mental 
depression to exuberant spirits, that is 
the blessed record of two years of ama- 
teur farming. What has done this ? Ex- 
ercise, actual hard work, digging in the 
dirt. We are made of dust, and the closer 
our companionship with Mother Earth in 
summer time the longer we shall keep 
above ground. Then the freedom from 
conventional restraints of dress ; no ne- 
cessity for “ crimps," no need of foreign 
hirsute adornment, no dresses with tight 
arm holes and trailing skirts, no high- 
heeled slippers with pointed toes, but 
comfort, clear comfort, indoors ai\d out. 

Plenty of rocking chairs, lounges that 
make one sleepy just to look at them, 
open fires in every room, and nothing too 
fine for the sun to glorify; butter, eggs, 
cream, vegetables, poultry — simply per- 
fect, and the rare, ecstatic privilege of 


Cooking Back. 


169 


eating onions — onions raw, boiled, baked, 
and fried at any hour or all hours. I 
said comfort ; it is luxury ! 

Dr. Holmes says : “ I have seen respect- 
ability and amiability grouped over the 
air-tight stove, I have seen virtue and in- 
telligence hovering over the register, but 
I have never seen true happiness in a 
family circle where the faces were not 
illuminated by the blaze of an open fire- 
place.” And'nature ! I could fill pages 
with glowing descriptions of Days Out- 
doors. In my own homely pasture I 
have found the dainty wild rose, the little 
field strawberries so fragrant and spicy, 
the blue berries high and low, so desira- 
ble for “ pie-fodder,” and daisies and ferns 
in abundance, and, in an adjoining mead- 
ow by the brookside, the cardinal flower 
and the blue gentian. Ail these simple 
pleasures seem better to me than sitting 
in heated, crowded rooms listening to in- 
terminable music, or to men or women 


170 QVbapting an ^battboncb .farm. 


who never know when to stop, or rush- 
ing round to gain more information on 
anything and everything from Alaska to 
Zululand, and wildly struggling to catch 
up with “social duties.” 

City friends, looking at the other side 
of the shield, marvel at my contentment, 
and regard me as buried alive. But when 
I go back for a short time to the old life 
I am fairly homesick. I miss my daily 
visit to the cows and the frolic with the 
dogs. All that has been unpleasant fades 
like a dream. 

I think of the delicious morning hours 
on the broad vine-covered piazza, the 
evenings with their starry splendor or 
witching moonlight, the nights of sound 
sleep and refreshing rest, the all-day 
picnics, the jolly drives with friends as 
charmed with country life as myself, and I 
weary of social functions and overpower- 
ing intellectual privileges, and every oth- 
er advantage of the metropolis, and long 


Cooking Back. 


171 

to migrate once more from Gotham to 
Gooseville. 

“ Dear country life of child and man ! 

For both the best, the strongest, 

That with the earliest race began, 

And hast outlived the longest, 

Their cities perished long ago ; 

Who the first farmers were we know.” 


THE END. 

























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